An Ocean Deep and Cold: A SHIELD Codex
by KhamanV
Summary: Having uncovered the trail of even more buried family secrets, Thor turns to his brother to help him puzzle out what he believes may be a secret of his own lineage - but Loki's weariness with Odin's faults means he is at first unwilling to help...
1. Chapter 1

An Ocean Deep and Cold: A SHIELD Codex

 _A man's mind can't stay in time the way his body does - John Steinbeck, East of Eden_

1.

. . .

There were few things Loki loved quite as much as being outrageously, maddeningly, even cheekily out of tune with his surroundings, and ordinarily the uncomfortable glances the Einherjar were sneaking at him in his fading jeans and favorite black cotton hoodie would give him joy beyond measure, but he was simply not feeling it right now. He wished he could, because one of them looked like they were about to vomit from tension at the sight of the disreputable prince on one of his scant free hours of late.

That said, Asgard's throne room was still empty for some reason, save for himself and the four awkward guards, and he used the extra time to resume fixating himself on the hardened and magically tweaked Starkphone he always carried off-Earth to be sure he was still getting important calls from his job. A job, which he realized at some point, he genuinely cared for.

Said job was also currently being a bastard to him, which, well, was fairly normal in its way. After a full year of nonstop nonsense and godforsaken troubles spanning an absolutely fascinating swath of improbabilities, SHIELD's current, almost quaintly old-fashioned mission had the genial air of a slow-motion train crash.

With him stuck in the conductor's cab, watching the end approach dead ahead, while passenger cabs full of minion SHIELD agents just screamed helplessly.

To put it bluntly, as he deeply wanted to do when Odin finally deigned to show the Hel up for this meeting he'd himself requested, Loki was _too goddamn busy_ for whatever intricate family disaster had cropped up now. Certainly he was, for once, fairly well assured that whatever it was about wasn't his fault.

That made him feel further annoyed.

Loki's thumb scrolled through a fresh batch of messages, absorbing the latest dry details of their collective impending doom with a distanced eye when a rush of fabric took him away from his thoughts. "Your Majesty," he said, looking up from his phone with a practiced and mild expression, that ingrained routine of a thousand years. Then he paused, looking again as the guards left them in privacy and actually _seeing_.

Odin looked unusually frazzled, which should not have been the first descriptive word to be associated with a grand old God-King of Asgard, but there it was. His one good eye kept flicking elsewhere as if his own thoughts were on something else, he brushed past Loki and the throne to a low bench drenched in the warm afternoon light, and he was wearing a simple brown and copper longtunic of the kind old men of Asgard liked to lounge in.

The screen of his phone kept lighting up to tell Loki he had more messages coming in. But none had the telltale ping of a real emergency, not at the moment, so he shoved it away into a pocket and continued to watch the silent king.

"Of a day, Loki," began Odin's greeting, still looking distracted. Then the old eye fixed on Loki, whose brows were knitting together with fresh tightness at the more casual than usual address. "I am aware Midgard is in the midst of certain difficulties, and you at the center of this current matter. I intend this to be brief, as a courtesy."

Loki decided against saying anything at first. That was usually his best option when he didn't want to start something. And then, sometimes even _that_ started trouble anyway. It was still worth the try.

"You should be made aware that Thor has left Asgard. He has requested privacy and has lost even Heimdall's gaze for the time being. As such, I do not know currently where he is, nor what he's about."

Loki, still feeling the silent buzz from his phone through the thick cotton of his jacket, kept watching Odin.

Odin licked his lips, looking tense and tired and possibly a little hurt.

"There was a fight," Loki said, flatly, recognizing all the old signs. Then he sighed, a full and knowing one. "Fine, we have those. Regularly, even. Why is _this_ fight notable enough that I'm being informed of it, and, please forgive my curtness, could the notification not have maybe been sent by text? I think Lady Sif has a spare phone from the last time she was on Earth."

"Such did not occur to me." That, in its softer tone, was typically going to be the closest Loki ever got to an apology. It would do. Then, to his absolute shock - "I'm sorry."

Loki blinked once, swiftly. "Um."

"Diplomatic issues. There are always such snarls when new kingdoms abrade against the old." Odin looked away while Loki tried to figure out what the hel _that_ had to do with Thor before he realized the old king was talking about his current problem instead. Heimdall must have briefed the king. "It's wise that this particular assembly has chosen a third party to oversee its security. A remarkable responsibility for any organization."

"And a complicated one." Loki managed to not make it sound chiding, at the cost of severe understatement. "I… _really_ don't have time for other issues right now."

"I know. But it occurs to me that in due course Thor may come to you, as he no doubt seeks some sort of understanding regarding what has come between us. He is yet your brother, and you his. I bring you into this with only one request, knowing that it might be difficult - _try_ to give him a moment of your time, if he does. I ask this not as the King of the Nine Realms, but as a father who has made… a certain number of mistakes."

Loki closed his eyes, swallowing down every annoyed or put-upon thing he could say with well-trained restraint chased down with a cocktail with growing confusion and concern. "What happened?"

"I think it would be better if it is spoken of between the two of you, if that should come about."

"Oh, gods." The words came with an air of weariness. Loki continued to complain, knowing it was mostly to himself. "See, this is one of our biggest issues as a family. No one just talks. We all do this… mythic dance around whatever's going on and hope no one turns into a cursed river or gets tied up in a tree or something else truly apocalyptic happens."

Odin wasn't listening to him again, staring out the window at who knew what. That figured, Loki thought. That much was normal, as far as the royal house of Asgard reckoned normal. "There are moments when apologies simply won't do," he said instead. "The only answers come from time, and from change."

Loki went back to not saying a single goddamn thing, because if he did, he would probably hit the roof doing so just out of earnest exasperation.

Then, to his shock renewed - "As you well know, of course."

All right, the emotional whiplash was starting to get on his nerves. To say nothing of the rare moment of full awareness and even, dear gods, actual empathy on the king's part. _Whatever's happened, it's clearly serious_. The phone continued to thrum in his pocket. He slid his hand over it, wondering what had gone wrong now. Thoughts tore around inside his head. He cared about whatever had happened, in some way, but…

The next buzz of his phone included a small but insistent chime. He swore under his breath, short but effective.

"You need to go."

He did. At any other time, he would have stayed and fought this out, but…

The Starkphone chimed again, seeming somehow louder. "My apologies, Your Majesty."

"None are needed. I only wanted to make my request, person to person." Odin watched him, that same small, strained expression on his face. "It is not the simplest thing I ask, but I believe it may become necessary."

 _It's a brotherly talk you ask patience for, All-Father, not exactly the end of the world all over again_. But he said none of that, and let the phone continue to bleat in his pocket, and he bowed and slipped away with a final nod to see who was in charge of letting him know what dog of war had broken free this time.

Odin watched him leave, and when Loki was gone, he looked as tired as he felt, which went deep to the bone.

. . .

Farbauti, the shaman queen of Jotunheim, glanced over and down at Odin as he shuffled comfortably back into the private royal lounge not far beyond the throne room, weariness still etched deep on the wrinkling skin above his beard. "I overheard."

"Of course you did. I should be glad you confess it."

"Mm. He's right, you know. All you lot can never simply talk it out. Much over centuries would have gone differently for us all, had one knock-noggin'd Asgardian or another dared but say clearly what was on their mind. I remind you, I will not be made complicit to this part of your troubles." Farbauti yawned, in some way deliberately emphasizing her distance from the problem.

Odin looked at her askance, and refreshed their goblets of wine with hands that were old but didn't tremble. "It's not for me to make right, not this. They'll find their own way. I am too much a god of war even at this age. My way is the sundering, not the suturing."

"How simplistic of you," said Farbauti, otherwise content to be cheerfully acerbic, and knowing she could get away with that and more under the banner of their current truce.

Still, that one good eye stared back at her. "I have a singular question, Your fellow Majesty, of a type personal but also borne of a deep curiosity."

Farbauti scooped up the larger goblet and leaned back on her bench, delighted at the old king's vocal annoyance. "Oh, _do_ ask."

Odin settled down in a cushioned seat of his own, the weariness giving way to a gleam of contentious friendliness. "Is it genetic, this sarcasm? Does it burn through the bloodline? It would explain a terrible amount about the man I raised as my second son."

Farbauti laughed, light and delighted. "Have I told you ever of my grandmother?"

"You have not."

"A grandiose woman, the beacon of our family. I loved her dearly. The more I see of the boy you and Frigga raised, the more I think of her." She gestured at him with her goblet. "Your kind feared our warriors among all others. How _fortunate_ you never met my Ma'mah. She was ruthless and clever and wise. Her reputation lingers among my people to this day, and there was a time that reputation rippled quietly through other realms as well. The only tempering she had was her mate, a good and gentle old shaman who liked to dream with the sacred old mosses under our ice. Such was her only chosen bridle, for she loved him, and he trusted her with the moon, and they were good leaders, in our little district of frost before the new wars. He would meet with all who felt the need to arrive in our little court, and she would size them up and scare them off at need, for he was far too kind to ever do so himself.

"So it came about, then, when I was a little girl and serving my first high winter at her knee, that we had a little… problem with a delegation out of Alfheim." She sipped at her wine at Odin's sudden look.

"All realms were sanctioned away from Jotunheim in those days, I thought. Bor saw to it."

"Yes, but it was a silly piece of paper and the Elves liked our ice better than theirs for their wines, and further they thought they could use us politically. Moreso if they created diplomatic wedges through our gentler lords and warlords - which is how one of their fluttery little noblemen decided they were going to arrive in our court and push for some agreement or another. I don't recall the details, they don't matter. The point was, the moment they arrived and were made welcome in the court would be the moment they won their cause - and we would be in the dip. My grandfather was just too good-natured. Once they had their in, the sanctions and a few other criminal wrinkles would mean they would win their way at our cost.

"My grandmother knew all that, and made her case before our small council - with me seated far at the end, watching her, rapt - that the delegation not be met in the grand hall. They agreed with her, but my grandfather, bound to his soft tradition, held firm that they would be welcomed. It would be a disaster to do so, but his values meant he could not bear to do otherwise. This was the crux the Elven envoy was relying on, of course."

Farbauti shrugged, her voice still lilting cheerfully through the story. "So the family scouts watched the Elves approach through a gentler streak of winter, and one morning they came to court. I walked with the welcoming delegation, I held the soft little hand of a fey-winged nobleman, and we brought them before the grand court of my district. And there I watched this spritely fellow go gray and old, for on the high chair sat my grandmother, _not_ my grandfather.

"'Er,' said this little man. I will remember his tiny, awkward squeak forever. It gave me delight in my prison, some nights. 'Oh my.' And then he muttered an absolutely terrible word to himself, for he and the Elves knew very well what my grandmother could be like.

"'Welcome, Lord such-and-such,' says my grandmother, low and gentle. I don't remember the little fop's name. I only met him the once. 'I am afraid my husband is ill. You came to parlay?'

"She kept a blade at hand at all times, of course. As we do. Not a little knife. She favored bone broadswords, and her best sat at her side, and she smiled, perfect and courtly, while this little elf began to die by degrees next to me. 'Will he recover shortly?' blurted the elf lord in a moment of foolishness and desperation, all his plans gone awry at the sight of her slender, wily face.

"She looked horrified, my grandmother, an absolute art of dismay and fury at the accidental breach of courtesy, and that well-trained grimace masking her glee at a most simple plan gone to perfection. Her look alone was enough to give him every answer he deserved. All the while, the broadsword sat there. She never even glanced at it, but it was enough to see that it was there.

"And the little elf rushed through his kindnesses before she flew into a murder that she had no intention of actually needing to commit, and they piled up the gifts they brought, and they took off within ten minutes, never stopping to bivouac, just got right the merry hel out of Jotunheim and never came back. Thus, her mere reputation as a bastard saved us all from that moment of ruin." Farbauti stopped to laugh. "Oh, Grandfather was all right, of course. That particular tincture of domberry and rotwine settles well with no one."

Odin blinked at the sudden turn. "Your grandmother _poisoned_ your grandfather to ensure the outcome of a political ploy."

"Well, he knew she would. If he were well, he would have had no choice but to hold the meet. He trusted in her to do it smartly, knowing that pretty much everyone else in the galaxy would rather die than try to bargain with her in his place. Which is its own story entire to wholly explain, of course, but I thought the bit with the poisoning was rather more poignant, in current context."

"Dear gods." Odin slouched, visibly contemplating the anecdote. "That _does_ sound like something Loki would do."

"Oh, they would have got on like a house on fire, I think." Farbauti looked distant. "She was the one who warned my mother about my coming marriage, and sent my aunt far away to ensure our children and our families would be well-supplied during the war. I still have not seen that aunt again, not for centuries. My grandmother's sometimes cold wisdom saved the family, however, in the end." She looked down at the old king. "But those are other tales, for other times." She smiled, a little sadly. "When times are not such bastards as we make of them."

With casual grace, she leaned out and patted the old king on the shoulder, a thing no one else would have the daring or cheek to do. But she was Farbauti, and she gave few damns about what others might do. "Your children will forgive you again in time. They were raised with enough kindness to do that. But first, you'll just have to suck it in and let them be hurt on their own terms."

"It is unpleasant."

"That, old king, is being a father." She sighed. "Would it make you feel any better if I told you that you at least did better with this one than Laufey might have?"

"You murder me with cold praise."

"Yes, well." She chuckled, warm and friendly, as she took up her goblet for one more good drink. "At least, in this new era, we've all grown past the part where I might have done it with a cold _knife_ instead."


	2. Chapter 2

2.

. . .

Alphonso 'Mack' Mackenzie knew better than anyone that his forte wasn't traditional diplomacy. Unfortunately, the current situation and his role in it wasn't about being diplomatic, exactly. It was about making sure ducks stayed in rows, trains ran on time, and nobody went straying off the reservation without four different backup plans and methods of contact on record. Logistics butted up against clockwork engineering. And that, Elena liked to tease him, was something he _was_ good at.

Also there had been the fact that nobody else was lining up to be on this job. No, the higher ups had decided it was his time in the barrel to dictate operations - along with Loki as the diplomatic front-face of the current team, which made a lot more sense than using Mack for that part of the job. Loki, at least, could fake it in a building full of generals, politicians, aides, coffee gophers, and all the other security problems that walked on two legs.

It did not help that they were shorthanded due to some behind-the-scenes bs.

Mack looked up as Loki came into the smallish ops room, closing the door behind him on the flurry of a large number of SHIELD agents running the more ordinary mass of tasks and checklists Mack needed them to get done. Loki looked stressed, which was unusual, since usually his poker face had its own, even more blank poker face. "Okay?"

His first response was a mild, distracted grunt. Then Loki seemed to collect himself. "What went wrong now?"

"Symkaria's losing its mind over Transia's request to overhaul the security cams in the E-E wing of the conference, claiming… guess what?" He at least tried to make it light.

"Latverian influence over Transia, with the other various factions, probably mostly Russian, taking sides and getting loud." Loki dropped into a chair with an uncharacteristic amount of sloppiness. "The usual nonsense with new and more irritating variables. What do I win?"

"A trip to the last surviving Radio Shack in Alaska with Turbo, probably. We got another hot rumor, too. This one says that von Doom is back at home and personally involved with everything that's going wrong, including the time last week when the contractors said the water pipes were leaking a tiny bit."

"Oh, good." A long-fingered hand dragged down over Loki's face from where he'd already been tugging agitatedly at his hair. "More paranoid garbage. Where'd _that_ come from, that git with the show where he attempts to die live on the air from apoplexy over the sexual habits of amphibians?"

"Just about." Mack pulled his tablet towards him as Loki next slumped back in his chair to study the ceiling. "We haven't made a dent in the _sane_ requests the UN is making, I don't even know where to begin with the mad crap. I mean, I understand. We _all_ remember what happened in Vienna a few years ago. That's never gonna happen again, not on our watch, but is it bad if I don't want to lose my damn mind over a guy in Norway who thinks it's a security problem that there's too much salt in the catering? Isn't half their diet salted fish anyway?"

"I would call it a reasonable stand, but then, my impatience with these sorts is fairly legendary and deep down we all know that the real security threat is going to be me crowning myself Emperor of the World and sending them all back to their rooms without supper an hour into this damned thing officially starting." Loki didn't move. Fortunately, he also didn't sound particularly serious. "I _cannot_ believe we're still only in the preliminary stages. How much longer is it until the conference itself? I try to not look at dates. They're depressing, even for a near-immortal."

"You don't want an answer."

The conference. This year's UN world council. UN events in general had become unusually exciting every year since Tony Stark had gone whole holiday ham with an Iron Man suit, and the rollercoaster ride that had become seemed to hit a new high regularly. The Accords, well, everyone remembered those. Then, last session, Wakanda had finally come out into the open air to show what only a few people in the entire world had even suspected.

Now a number of central European states wanted to solidify their places in the tumultuous union. Formerly quiet nations looking at power vacuums caused by the changes in the European Union. Transia, a former slice of Romania, heavily militarized. Symkaria, a modern monarchy with a number of natural resources and a lax idea of external diplomacy. And Latveria, trying to stabilize itself after their own dear leader had gone missing - under circumstances SHIELD knew more about than most.

And then there was all the other shitshows going on around the world. Including at home. And so, as SHIELD attempted to reclaim its place as a reliable watchman of that world, they had been quietly approached to manage and monitor security at the event. As an olive branch. As a functional third party, whose politics did not seem tied to the current administration. Another positive.

And also as a test, to see if they managed to fudge something up on the public scale again.

General Talbot was still a mite upset about recent events, with the organization only recently recovering its position and turf at home. It was understandable, sure. But it was also a giant pain in their collective ass.

"Hell."

Yeah, that summed it up, really. Mack studied Loki's attempt to resemble a corpse, feeling sympathetic. "Asgard went smooth, then."

"Ruddy, bloody hell." The pale hand came up again to tug at his face, pinching at the top of his nose as if his sinuses were bothering him, the only answer Mack was going to get. He understood. Family. "All right. Pass me my share of the latest stack of emergent troubles. I'll spent the next four hours on the phone, wrangling cats so they might stop screaming for a night or two."

"I'd just like to make it through a meal without something else blowing up." Mack paused. "The thing is, the emergency ping I sent you wasn't really over that. I need you on something ASAP."

Loki managed to lift his head a mere two inches, just enough to flutter a suspicious, weary eye his way.

"I got a diplomatic call from one of the main players. They requested you specifically." Mack picked up the notice and flashed the intricate Xhosa-style letterhead at him. "On the bright side, it should be a pretty chill meet."

An eyebrow arched. That caught his attention. "Where?"

"He's in New York tonight. Can get you there and back in time for pizza."

. . .

Wakanda had already opened several locations in the US from which they could operate diplomatically. Not embassies, although they were completing one not far from DC according to UN standards, but locally-engaged outreach centers, beginning in California. For now, though, East Coast meetings often happened through a small but growing facility on the poorest edge of Harlem, where young Wakandan women in casual gear that blended the most colorful of both worlds kept an eye on security. War dogs, according to SHIELD's intel sheets. Battle-ready spies who knew more of the foreign West than most Wakandans, and probably many westerners. Some now acted as liaisons for their King, as well as his careful eyes.

At the door waited one of the Dora Milaje. Loki recognized her as one of the most important figures in the King's service, possibly even their general, although he wasn't privy to their organization and had enough sense not to pry deeply into it. She'd been among those who watched over the throne the one time he'd been in Wakanda, and she gave him a knife-like look of recognition now. There was no approval or disapproval in her eyes, just a bland acknowledgment that here was a man, and there he stood.

Which meant also no overt hostility, so Loki decided he'd take it. There was something about Wakandans, that culture of pure ability and respect only when earned, that had previously drilled into him that he was not about to ever start trouble with them - some of these warriors just might be capable of going toe to toe with an Asgardian in a fight. And if they weren't toe to toe, but on _their_ turf and terms, it might well end very badly for a demigod.

He'd learned about underestimating humans. These were humans at a secretive peak of capability. Loki _liked_ not getting his ass kicked unnecessarily.

The warrior nodded her sleek, bare head to him in silence and led him inside the center, which was also a new community library, to where the King of Wakanda sat in one of the quiet reading rooms waiting for him.

"Your Majesty," said Loki, automatically. A millennia of courtly rule had its uses, even on this modern Earth. He kept his head tilted low as T'Challa rose from his seat. A moment later, the king reached out his hand in a more casual greeting. Loki took it with his, didn't test its strength. It was a small thing from Asgardian tradition, but a meaningful one. "An honor, again."

"And on, I hope, less careful terms, although our last went well enough to give me confidence in this hour." T'Challa nodded to the woman. "Thank you, Okoye. Will you ask one of the men to bring us some coffee?"

T'Challa gestured to the window set in the far wall when she'd left. Beyond it was a vibrantly painted room with young children seated in a circle, listening to a volunteer read to them from a book with a familiar fuzzy yellow bear and his piglet friend on the cover. They were transfixed, not interested in looking at the two men only a wall away. "I do not think I will tire of these small, pleasant sights soon. It's good to try to fix problems, not hide them."

"I've come, over the years, to agree. With what some might think is a strange amount of verve." Loki snorted in a small laugh. "There's a time and place to keep one's mouth shut, but maybe that ought to not be a default."

T'Challa seemed to contemplate that, but he said nothing. Something, some incident had brought Wakanda into the world, and Loki knew some of the outlines of that incident from the intelligence documents. Good enough to guess from. He left it alone. He also decided whatever this was about, he'd let the king lead the conversation.

One of the staff slipped into the room and left a humble wooden tray with a silver press coffee set, then disappeared again. Loki poured them both a cup, again acting on basic royal instincts. T'Challa took it with a small nod. "I am aware SHIELD is operating behind the scenes for security at the UN conference in the next month. We received our copy of the brief last week." He took a sip, still watching the children in the next room. "I think this is good. I have confidence in your organization. I am, however, also aware that there are those who are would like to make it… difficult."

Loki joined him at the glass again, sipping his coffee and watching the volunteer read aloud. "We're following a number of rumors about who might attempt a disruption and why." He didn't bother with the usual reassuringly politic version of the screed. T'Challa was the sort of man to appreciate forthrightness. "They're being investigated, naturally, but as ever, so far most of these rumors, even the more dangerous ones, fade into little concern once we follow them."

T'Challa paused, his fingers toying with the edge of his cup. "We have… intercepted some of these more dangerous rumors as well."

Loki licked his lips, feeling a fresh tension headache start right behind his eyes. If Wakanda's deeply-embedded security eyes had found something… "I'm not going to like this, am I?"

A slight smile crossed the king's face, both dour and amused. "Unless you like Latveria a great deal." He turned away from the window to look at Loki, noting the crease between his eyes. "Which I think you do not."

Loki brought up a hand to rub at his face. This was not what they needed. An active and potentially successful political threat on their watch might be the final nail to put SHIELD under for good. "We'd received a direct rumor about their involvement in something to do with the building's infrastructure at the meeting. It didn't seem to have the endurance on it to be a real threat. Not to dither, but it's just not possible for Doom's influence to be behind any of this."

"That's… not exactly what we have." T'Challa finished his coffee and set his cup aside. "We've intercepted certain contacts." He didn't expand. The War Dog spy network was rumored to be formidable - as was Wakanda's silence on the topic. "In the interest of cooperation, I've already had a copy of our findings prepared for you. While certain things were redacted for our security, I assure you everything salient is in the report. If there are questions on the matter, you may contact Okoye through the embassy line."

Okoye had slipped back into the room at some point. Loki never heard her come in, only the sensory whisper of another person's aura hinting to him that it had happened. Impressive. He turned and inclined his head to her with careful politeness. She handed him a tiny data drive only after glancing to her king.

"Thank you," said Loki, his head still bowed but aware of the actions around him. When he came back up, there was the barest glimmer of approval from her. He palmed the drive away in his suit jacket, which then proceeded to vibrate excitedly at him as if he'd accidentally petted something.

The phone.

The _gods-damned_ phone.

Loki's armor of politeness slipped just a titch, a tweak felt along an eyelid, a sensation of tension at the corner of his mouth. T'Challa gave him a small grin of sympathy as he slid the phone out to glance at the caller.

Mack on the priority line. Of course. "My pardon," said Loki, with real apology, and he hit to accept call as the king graciously looked away. His answering whisper could have been a bit more congenial in tone. " _You_ just _sent me out here, now you need me back?_ "

" _We've… got a new situation_." Mack sounded nonplussed. " _A really specific one._ "

Cold steel thunderbolted out of the sky and landed in Loki's gut. He _knew_. He knew exactly what that situation was. For once in his entire damned life, a member of his overdramatic family had provided an actual, useful notice previous to the actual, obnoxious circumstance. Sure, it turned out to be remarkably _short_ notice, but it was _something_.

 _Ye gods and twinkly damn stars, even old Odin can learn something new_.

That didn't resolve the irritation flickering all along his skin. "I'm already aware, I think. Relates to prior. I'll be back as soon as possible." Loki paused, then added his own vaguely useful warning. "Don't let him into the leftovers, you'll regret it."

" _Good advice. He looks like he wants to stress-eat_. _Coulson's already expanding the pizza order._ "

Loki hung up and found both Okoye and T'Challa now outright watching him with faint matching smiles. "Families," he said, strained.

"Oh, yes," said T'Challa.

"You know how it is."

" _Oh_ , yes."

Loki patted at his suit pocket, distantly absorbing their amusement and not really up to questioning after it right now. "I appreciate the information. We'll get someone to look it over right away." He nodded to Okoye. "Thank you in advance for your assistance."

The barest head tilt in response. But a friendly enough one. It was something.

Loki slipped out of there, managing to not trip on half a dozen free-range children just released from a different reading room.


	3. Chapter 3

3.

. . .

"I like what you did to your hair."

Thor nodded to Daisy as she dropped onto the concrete bench next to him in the rooftop sanctuary, patting at his shaggy brush cut with affecting awkwardness. "Ah, thank you."

Daisy seemed to resist the urge to touch it, looking him over in his gym rat-slash-Canadian bacon 'undercover' Earth outfit and not missing the hangdog expression that capped it off. Trying to find some tact and mostly missing it, she asked, "Isn't there some Viking thing about not cutting your hair unless you lose a battle or something?"

"I'm… fairly sure someone made that up." Thor chuckled, the glumness fading a little. "I'm going to tell Fandral that, though. Man's had the same style for six hundred years, I'd almost run out of ways to rib him over it."

"Is that the guy with the goatee that was super rude that one ti-"

"Yes, that's Fandral. Gods, I almost forgot about that." Thor squinted at the orange line of the horizon.

" _I_ didn't. Grand dinner in Asgard with the royal family? Might be a nightly event for you, dude, but for me that was like some Iron Chef bucket list thing." She leaned back. "But anyway, you don't look like you're up for hashing out random depressing stuff."

"Mmm."

"Hyperfixated on just one depressing thing."

Thor glanced at her, getting a sympathetic grin back. "Good catch."

"We're big on noticing stuff around here. Kind of a job dealie." Daisy tossed her hair over her shoulder, then clasped her hands together and looked at the sunset. "Mack would have called Loki about twenty minutes ago. I don't know if he's gonna bother with the jet home or just magic that action. Either way, he should be back pretty soon now. You staying for dinner?"

"I was told there will be pizza. I won't lie to you, Miss Johnson. It's one of the better Midgard temptations." Thor couldn't resist a small grin of his own. He liked pizza _very_ much.

"Especially from our regular joint. We've got a special, you gotta have a slice. We call it the Lyin' Vegetarian. It's sauce, cheese, then all you see is mushrooms, onions, green peppers, olives, and sweet red peppers. Sometimes banana peps and dried tomatoes if we're feeling it. And then, between the cheese and all those veggies, is a full layer of top shelf pepperoni. The hard-and-fast rule is, you can _not_ see it under the vegetables."

"Thus the lie."

"There's something about that much veggie that just really makes the pepperoni pop. We started getting it because we have this one guy in Research who is like _technically_ Hindu, and by that I mean he's Hindu at home when his family's watchin' him, but that guy craves the burger like a thirsty man in a desert. So last year he actually brings his family to one of the not-top-secret work parties and we had, like, a real veggie pizza and some other stuff so they'd feel welcome because they're super nice… and _that_ pizza, which our team snuck him over to, and I think he'd die for us now."

Somewhat at a loss, Thor managed to offer a pleasant-sounding, "That does sound tasty."

"Whatever's up, dude, with us you can at least eat your emotions." Daisy rubbed her palms together. "Kind of a chilly night coming in. Hey. Random little question."

"Of course."

"Do you know someone back home named Kara?"

"I…" Thor visibly paused. She _had_ specified it was random. He thought. It took a while. "There _was_ a young woman in the Queen's service named such. A handmaiden, if I recall correct. No one important, and the name is a relatively common one otherwise. Why?"

"Not a big thing. We had this deal last year, with the Framework… I'm not gonna be able to explain this easily. But we all got plugged into an artificial reality and the people that did it made damn sure to get Loki out of the way really early on, which is _amazing_ , because usually he somehow gets sent out of town before the really big crap blows up on us, and there was some stuff that went down inside." Daisy shrugged. "I met some lady with that name working in the Asgardian embassy Loki was running. In the, uh, alternate reality. I didn't get a lot of detail then, thought maybe she was just a random he used to know, like an NPC pulled from his brain. We all had a couple. Turns out, he _really_ doesn't want to talk about it. I just thought I'd ask."

Thor studied the young woman, frowning. That didn't quite sound like a small thing, but with Loki it could be hard to know what mattered and what didn't. "If he's that reserved about such a matter, be cautious."

"Oh yeah, dude. That's all I was gonna ask." She shrugged. "He talks when he talks."

Thor opened his mouth to say something to that, when the door to the rooftop sanctuary opened and an ordinary looking agent in slacks and a polo stuck his head out. He nodded to Daisy when she looked over, and she gave him the thumbs up back. "He's in. Dinner's on. He's all yours after that."

. . .

Loki watched Thor hold in a burp with a surprising amount of consideration instead of watching the occasional cluster of agents come into the cafeteria to sneak after dinner snacks. He knew what they were looking at. Two alien gods stuffed in a corner, letting some sort of unspoken tension build in the air around them. Not a common sight for them. For Loki, it was almost the scent of home.

Loki let the bottoms of his palms do the work of turning a thick-bottomed coffee mug around in his hands, wrinkling his nose at the rich, thick smell, and finding it acceptable.

It better be, since it was brewed from his personal bag of coffee, and he never left it alone by the carafe. These people kept reusing paper filters. They drank the kind of coffee that was purchasable in giant plastic tubs. And worse, sometimes they didn't set up a refill on the ruddy thing when it was almost empty. They were occasionally barbaric in their habits, left to their own devices. It drove him batshit.

The one time scourge of Midgard, now the easily riled guardian of the gods-damned common-area coffee pot.

Thor glanced around in silence, looking as awkward as he did when they were children and some authority figure or another was mad at them again. The shorn blonde hair had thrown Loki for a moment, but he decided he wasn't going to say anything about it.

Or really, much of anything at all.

Let Thor direct the damned conversation, if he chose. At least Loki would get a few minutes of quiet away from the phones and the other agents on the UN job. And if Thor wanted them to just sit in uncomfortable silence until one of them had to wander away, that would be fine, too.

That wasn't the warmest way Loki could be thinking about it, and the smallest pang of guilt hit him. He took a sip of his coffee, looked away past his brother's head, and waited out the silence.

"Seems busy here," said Thor, prodding at that quiet.

"Usually is." He kept his voice neutral. "Sometimes moreso than others." The peevishness tried to sneak back in despite his control. The mug came back up to his face, to try and swallow it down.

"I'm sorry to interrupt it."

Loki glanced at the door, watched Agent May come in, pass a word with some other agent, leave again. Then other agents, all of it flickering through the moments like playing cards through the spokes of a bicycle tire. He kept his tongue, and just watched.

Thor shifted in his seat. There was a large glass of water by his hand, and he gently shoved it away so he could clasp those hands together atop the table. "I didn't know who else I could talk to." Loki saw his face tweak in a wince, just at the edge of his vision. "That's not quite right. Not what I mean. I know who I wanted to talk to. I'd rather talk to _you_ about what's going on, I just…" He trailed off.

Oh, this was already interminable. His hands tightened around the mug, guilt twanging again at the thought. Fine, a lifeline, then. It was the least he could do. "What did Odin do this time?"

That wince crossed Thor's face again, sharper and deeper. "It's not exactly what he did. It's something I may have found out."

"About what he did at some other point previous to your discovery. Odin advised me you were upset. He even suggested you may be coming." He put the mug down, pretending to ignore Thor's jolt of surprise. "There's a pattern to these things. Let's jump to the part where you just blurt out what the hell he did wrong this time."

Thor continued to sit there, going terribly, portentously still. That itself told Loki it was going to be bad this time. How bad?

The silence grew, tightening and coiling around them.

"It may well be that neither of us are Frigga's children."

The room went deathly cold. "What?"

"She might not have borne me, either, Loki. I found records with some… _meaning_ to them that I don't understand yet. I found no other clues. And then I left Asgard to think, when Odin would not answer my direct questions based on those clues except in the vaguest of ways."

Loki restrained himself, scanning the walls, forcing his thoughts back into order, feeling the coldness bury itself inside him. He realized he wasn't actually all that surprised. When he spoke, it was with exhaustion weighing down each word. "Oh for gods' sakes."

"Odin only told me there had been something to do with strengthening the nine realms, that Frigga was involved, that-"

Thor's voice went on. Loki realized about two minutes later he wasn't actually listening. The coldness was there instead, crackling in his ears. He didn't know what he felt. Then he knew he was angry, and tired, and at the fringes of them, more dangerous emotions. A deepness he tried to avoid. Things that led to… He tried to cut them off before they grew. "What do you want me to say?"

Thor looked at him. "I… I don't know. I wanted someone to-"

"To what? Be there for you?" The coldness was breaking, despite himself. He wanted it to stop, the coldness was safer, but it wouldn't. The point of no return had been nearly ten years ago, and the melting was fresh again now. "Go talk to your friends. Them Avengers."

"Loki-"

"They've all got tragic backstories and whatnot. They'll sit you down, pat you on the back, give you a listen, and Stark's got a lovely wine bar put in at the new facility." Someone else was talking out of his mouth. He couldn't silence them, and he couldn't look at his brother. "Even if what you fear is true, what do you need from me?"

"I thought you might understand." Thor sounded hesitant now. Young, and surprised.

"I do." As flat as everything else. The color seemed leeched from the room. "I understand deeply. There are vast caverns tunneled throughout Asgard that could be filled with everything Odin doesn't speak of, even when he should. You have my sympathies on that. Gods know what else will emerge one day that he might have spoken of in a better time. Vats of hidden sea children. Werepeople. A pocket dimension full of stolen pennies. A jar containing a demon he won a bar bet with when he was a child. Who knows. Of course, that last one might just be me instead, and I pretend to forget about it." At least when he was so dead-voiced, he didn't sound mocking. "What else do you want?"

"I-" Hurt was creeping into Thor's voice. "I have some threads, things I was going to investigate after I went away for a while. I needed to think, to recenter myself, to-"

"Undergo a radical style change." It blurted out, acerbic. _Gods_ , what was he doing? "I can't help you." The coldest words yet.

Thor leaned back, studying him. The hurt was now so plainly etched that he looked wooden.

The saner part of him tried to balance what he was saying with the truth. "I'm busy. I'm needed here." It still came out bitter.

"When we were children-"

"It's now. We're in the now." Loki found himself leaning forward, careening back towards the crash point. "You have my sympathy. I can't give anything else. I gave up everything just to survive, and to come here. You think you're out of joint, that you're not who you believed. Oh, I feel you on that, Thor. I do."

The bitterness broke. Something wilder crept into his voice, and he was furious with himself for letting it free, but that didn't stop it. "And when I discovered what I felt, what I was, where were you? What were you? Where was anyone? Thor, I fell alone, as alone as I have been my entire life, from where people thought I was and where I actually wasn't and never had been. No one helped me, no one _could_ help me, not even Frigga saved me from that lie, and I fell. And then, I came back, and _no one_ asked what had gone wrong, why had I broken."

His voice was rising. "No one _ever asked_. Not you. Not Odin, who started the whole damned fire in the first place. I was put in another box, and you let me out when you needed me, and you never asked why I was really put there. The madness is mine own make, and what I did is my responsibility. And yet before that I am dragged before Odin and I tell him - near begging - just _swing_ the damned axe, because I'm tired of what I've been and what I never was. He had no mercy for me then. Even in that moment there wasn't yet any truth between us."

There were people, other agents, openly staring at them now as Loki's voice spiraled up. He felt their glances, going between him and his brother. He kept thinking of Odin's request. No wonder Odin had made it.

No wonder he was now having a difficult time trying to honor it.

"So I lived. I've even mostly forgiven him, though I think things are not healed. I don't know if they will. And I'm needed _here_ , Thor. They know what happened to me here. They _asked_. And I'm-" Loki tried to pull his control together, lowering his voice for the agents that were watching him if nothing else.

He saw Fitz among that group, one of his friends, looking at him as if he were worried about _him_ and not assuming that Thor was in the right here. Though deep down, Loki knew that he was also not fully in the right. His voice tried to gentle, not to soothe the hurt but to calm himself down. "We are _busy_. The one thing our family tried to instill in both of us was our duty to the realms. And this may not be Asgard, but I have here a place and title and they need me. I cannot run off on some new brotherly scheme with you. Those days are very likely done, Thor."

Loki got up, realizing he was unsteady. Nothing about this was what he should have said, what Thor needed to hear. But it had also, for better or for worse, been at least one angle of the truth. "I'm sorry," he managed to say before turning his back on their table. "I can't do this right now. This is on Odin, just as what he did to me."

It wasn't supposed to look like fleeing. In his mind, he knew that's exactly what it was.

There were a thousand other things left unsaid. They chased him down the hall, and Loki shut his mind to them as best he could.


	4. Chapter 4

4.

. . .

Phil Coulson was back to being nominally in charge of SHIELD day-to-day, under the eagle-eye and bad haircut close study of General Talbot, a man who was never inclined to be cheerful. Being that he was still recovering from multiple surgeries that had, to be fair to him, at least _seemed_ to be SHIELD's fault.

Being also that no one was still rotting in jail, and they were now on the high-profile UN thing, and the public polls had them very slightly in the positive, hell, Phil was going to take it. If Talbot wanted to send nastygrams over procedure, Phil would handle it. If Talbot wanted to send someone down to nitpick uniforms and throw tables around, cool, he could ride it out. Phil understood stress. He _got_ stress on a deep and spiritual level. He could _write_ the Tao of Stress and work the motivational speaker circuit for the book tour.

He'd worked with Nick Fury for decades. He took a magic alien pokey stick in the chest. He came back from the dead. He could _deal_ , is how Phil would put it, in short.

Which meant that the dead-aired aura of tension that filled the corner office where Loki was currently working meant it was just another Casual Friday for Phil.

Not only could Phil deal with stress, he could deal with Loki when he was on his high-wire streaks.

It was pretty much the same thing.

"Hey," said Phil, letting himself into the danger room and leaving the door open. He glanced at a stack of file folders stuffed with uncharacteristic messiness under a digital tablet, then took in the rest of the space. Dog-eared edges on the folders themselves. A stone-corked bottle half-hidden under a chair. The phone face down with its magical and protective case looking a little more squishy than usual. A small ding in the far wall where something had gotten chucked out of Loki's way - not really thrown, it would still be embedded in a load-bearing wall three rooms away if Loki had full-on hardballed something. Loki himself in a black cotton hoodie with a zipper that had been fidgeted up and down the zips so many times it was starting to wear smooth. Small clues. Phil already had the rest of the picture. He went all in, choosing to practically chirp like a songbird at dawn. "So, how's the family?"

The look he got was _so_ worth it.

"That good, huh?"

"Coulson, is there any point in begging you to stop before you get started?"

"Probably not. He's still on four, slowly working his way towards the exit. If depression had a physical avatar, it would probably look a lot like a bodybuilder in a denim gym rat costume."

Something tweaked in Loki's face at the description. It cut a slice out of the tension trapped in the room, which was what Phil was going for. Then Loki looked away again, down to the paperwork cradled in his hands, where his expression went smooth and blank and, to Phil, still weirdly pretty readable.

 _This guy has been around us_ way _too long_ , thought Phil, studying that face. _Or I've been around him way too long_. "How's the Wakandan thing you brought back tonight?"

The shift in topic eased Loki immediately. "I've already kicked the leads over to Field Research with a copy to the tag team we've got on site in Brussels." He licked his lips, thinking. "I can't shake the belief that there's nothing to this, and yet, if their people say they've got something…"

" _This_ being the Latverian angle people keep rumoring at us?"

"Doom is not back." Loki set the papers down and rested his hip against one of the filing cabinets. "I would know."

Phil waited for an explanation, with his patented 'I'm waiting for an explanation' expression clear on his face.

Loki waved a hand at him. "When Agent May and I were in Norway for some idiot thing last year that turned out to be nothing. I took a couple of personal days, went down near to the Latverian border, and set up a passive etheric trap-net."

"I know some of those words."

"It does exactly one thing, which is wait for a precise magical energy signature to appear within a certain radius of it. Beyond that, it is so inert that it is functionally nonexistent. It is an automated doorbell that goes to me, Strange, that terminal down in Room 42 that I told anyone who isn't part of my division not to ever touch, and, if I put it in the system right, also pages you if Victor von Doom returns to this physical plane anywhere near Latveria. Full stop. He's not home."

"I also know some of those words, but I think I've got the gist now." Phil sighed. "So it's all just, what, people on edge?"

"Probably."

"Lot of that going around." His tone made it far from a subtle segue back to the original topic, but for the look Loki gave him _this_ time, it was still absolutely worth it. "Why'd you pop off at Thor?"

"I- Gods, I don't know, all right? It's nothing." The hand flapped in the air again as Loki turned away to slam a now-unnecessary file into the cabinet.

Metal whanged through the room at his action, hollow and basso, pointing out the white lie with almost sonorous good cheer.

"That's a big, poundin' nothing." Phil watched the tall, broad shoulders tense. "Fitz was worried about you."

Loki tensed further, but didn't turn around. It was _weird_ knowing how to push the buttons of a guy that used to command invading armies. Phil wouldn't change a bit of it. Especially when 'hey your friends give a rip' actually worked in a pinch. "I upset Thor, I trashed Odin's request, I'm sorry it happened, and I'm… I just don't feel like apologizing to Thor about it right now."

"Okay." Phil pushed his back against the closed door and chilled, waiting for it.

Took about half a minute for the boulder to start clanking downhill. "It's Odin. Again. It's always _gods-damned_ Odin. I told him that. It's absolutely ridiculous, do you know? We're at peace. I'm not the worst thing about the family any longer, I'm not on the verge of execution for something else awful I did. Most of the horrible bits we've gone through are smoothed out. Jotunheim is at peace with us. And yet one thing, small or large, can go awry and _everyone_ starts screaming at each other again."

"Yeah, that's a family."

"Ours takes it to _operatic_ levels of nonsense. The family crest should be golden dishes full of food smashing into marble walls. And that one thing - Odin's the flashpoint. Always something else he did and everyone else gets cut to bone. For _gods' sakes_."

Coulson shifted against the door. "What I overheard through the vine, you got called to Asgard just before this went down? That's when he made some request?"

"Yeah. He made an effort this time, I suppose. Gave warning family drama was afoot." Loki appeared to decide that the grey industrial wall wasn't the best view and gave up, heading for a chair. He dropped into it with the sort of stony exhaustion that reminded the bolts of it that he was rather heavier than most humans, and that he liked to carry grudges against inanimate objects. "It didn't actually help, in my opinion. I give him credit for trying, though, which makes it all the more aggravating how upset I've apparently decided to be about it. Gods _damn_ it all."

"Why doesn't it help?"

Loki shook his head silently, now staring at a different wall. Then he glanced at the ceiling, licking at his lips. "It's complicated."

"Loki, just dump it. What the hell is going on?" Phil did know, mostly. The thing in the cafeteria had gotten _really_ loud.

"It doesn't matter, really, not the details. Besides, you probably already heard. It's Thor's problem, and Odin's, apparently. And it might not even be true. He's upset over a _maybe_. A maybe that aligns his problems with my own long-standing ones. And he felt, not unreasonably, that I might be sympathetic. And Coulson, I am. That's not the issue. That's not what I'm upset about."

"Okay."

"Odin calls me in and asks me to be a kind ear to Thor. And someone should be, and I understand that, but do you know what my brain, my occasionally deeply resentful, grudging, furious brain is grinding itself apart on? That fabulous bit of me that's gotten me in trouble on the regular for centuries?" It was rhetorical. Loki kept barreling on. "It's stuck seething over the popular notion that I'm supposed to drop everything and nurse his wounded spirit when _no one_ in the family _ever_ did that for me when I needed it." The glance Phil got was hot and pissed off, and mostly at himself. "It's more complicated than that for them, too, but I-just—"

Phil shifted his weight, calmly waiting and letting Loki spill it all out.

" _Someone_ leaves these idiotic self-help books around my corner of the library. All this rot about trauma recovery and whatlike. I even read a couple of them for a laugh. I get it, Coulson. I understand the human motive towards forgiveness and moving on. I can intellectually appreciate the concepts of being the better person, healing, growing up, blah blah blah."

Now the long, pale hands were animated, waving in the air with frantic irritation.

"Few of them like to discuss the truth. It is _not easy_ to just toss aside the feeling that you were hurt, that you were wronged, but they say that you're supposed to just wipe off the blood and get up from the floor and be stronger and that _you're_ the one that's supposed to heal when _others_ did as much or as more to cause these problems, and _you're_ the one supposed to slap a healer's rag on your face and call it closure when it's very, terribly, horrifically easy to remember that there are things that still hurt. And why. And what you did to get through it. What you did to others, and damn right you get to carry that part by yourself. And it doesn't just go away. It's so easy for others to tell you to just get over it. And _none of it is easy_.

"I'm sorry Odin's done stupid things. Is it so damned awful and selfish of me that I'm not up to tearing myself open on someone else's behalf because of it?"

Okay. Wow. Phil knew whatever it was, it was going to be dramatic and rough. It was the Odinson clan, it was a given. Several years ago, as eldritch entities tore through time and space, Loki had gone through a near nervous breakdown as Coulson not only tore him free from demonic influence, but also got an eyeful of The Big Blue Family Secret. He'd talked Loki down by offering to get drunk and discuss crappy dads at a better time.

Really, there had been a lot of that since.

He hadn't, however, been prepared for the amount of wounded bitterness and still-youthful self-resentment Loki just dropped onto the table with his latest rant.

But that he _had_ , well, it was something. "If it's a little selfish, I think it probably is in the way we're supposed to be." Coulson shrugged at the look he got. "I didn't pick up a degree in therapeutics or anything, and I promise I'm not the one leaving the books. You gotta watch out for yourself a little, and yeah. I know that people like to say 'get over it.' It's a limited use statement, in my opinion. It's a short term bandage, gets you through a tough spot, then you deal with it in better depth later. But I tend to have to patch people up in the field. It's not a family pack deal."

"But you're also going to think I was harsh on him."

"Well, yeah, but I _do_ get where you're coming from." Coulson grabbed a chair that had been sitting, ignored, by the door and swung it over by the desk to sit down. "Here's the thing, though. Okay. With full acknowledgment that I'm one of those people that's gonna say something that's easier said than done from your perspective, yeah, I think you were harsh. I think it's not so much that you're _supposed_ to be magically healed from being goaded into becoming a crazy asshole within a decade and get over everyone else's part in that, but that I can tell you're mad at yourself because you know you don't want someone else to go through that. Especially your brother, who you've been pissed at for thinking he's a big shot for like six hundred years. But deep down he's still your brother and nobody gets to stab him in the back but you." Loki stared at him. "Gods, you tire me."

Phil smirked.

"I'm still not going to drop everything and run off with him on some idiot vision quest or whatever he thinks he needs this time. _I am needed here._ " Loki gestured at the piles of work in front of him. "It matters, as idiotic as all this is. It matters to you. It matters to me. This is a particularly important circumstance for SHIELD. It is an active reminder as to why your species has such short average lifespans, because the sheer fiddly bullshit nonsense of this task has already taken a good thirty years off mine." Loki stopped to laugh, high and suddenly, genuinely, amused. "Although, to be fair, I think I'm already beating my own life expectancy based on lifestyle and behavior."

"Yeah, probably." Phil plucked the digital tablet off the desk, glancing at it. "You know, you keep forgetting one really important thing about how you can deal with all of this."

"How's that?"

"You're not doing this alone." Phil turned the tablet on with a flick of his artificial thumb. "Let's come up with some dumb ideas, here. Push the stress around a bit."

"Coulson. It's my task. I've got Mack and-"

"And you guys are understaffed because Talbot's up our asses like it's some sort of final exam and now you've got one of those crazy family emergencies. They happen. We deal with 'em." Phil grinned. "That's what I do every day, Loki. I deal with other people's BS, and I've gotten pretty good at it. Let's work out a rough new plan here. See what you're willing to move around for your brother's sake. Come up with a day trip style plan. Vision quests are important too, all right?"

" _Gods_." Buried deep under the single acerbic word, Coulson could tell he was slightly touched. Loki looked away before coming up with one last protest. "You know the proper Asgardian tradition is that we let arguments simmer for a good decade before bringing them back up. Not try to deal with it same day."

"And look how well that's worked out for everyone."

"…Fair point."

. . .

Daisy snuck around a corner of the underground facility, watching Thor as he stared at a vending machine everyone else called The Sadness. Installed in 1992, it was the sole provider of SHIELD-logo'd bags of 100 calorie unsalted peanuts, generic seltzer water in various horrific flavors, black licorice, plain pretzels, a rack of bubblegum that had been in there so long they had to have gone flavorless, and, for variety, a darkened alley of discolored bags of Funyuns so sketchy that Engineering had a theory they had actually been manufactured a hundred years in the future, sent back to the sixties, and then corralled into a cardboard box to one day be loaded into The Sadness, where they now waited to close their stable time-loop and save the rest of the Funyun People.

No one had ever bought anything from The Sadness.

The way Thor looked, Daisy felt pretty sure that streak wasn't going to break tonight. Especially since the God of Thunder, hot shit of who literally knew how many battles, seemed to have no clue she was standing there. The grapevine had her hooked up. She knew a good chunk of what went down with Loki. The rest… "Hey, uh. Dude."

Thor turned his head to look at her. "Miss Daisy."

 _Christ_ , he looked even more depressed. She managed to not wince, knowing it helped to be prepared. Coulson had asked her to come down, play it straight. "Loki handles stress like crap. Like, I'm not going to apologize for him. His attitude is his problem, and sometimes he goes off in ways that he's gotta deal with after. But yeah, things are… a _little_ wild right now."

"So I am to understand." He looked at the vending machine again. "This is not food."

"Most definitely not. You snacky again?"

"Not really."

"Depression snacky."

Thor made a particularly scrunched kind of face. "Do I really look like the kind of person that does that?"

"Yeah. You look like you either eat, beat the crap outta something, or wander around and pout when things go bad. If not all of the above in order."

The scrunch again. "Far too observant around here."

"Told ya earlier." Daisy jerked a thumb over her shoulder. "You want to do something dumb, like answer phones for us for like an hour or three?"

"Why?"

"Because we always need warm bodies with decent security clearance who're willing to sit on their ass for a few hours and listen to someone trying to call in and tell us why their dog or whatever is trying to summon the aliens from Proxima Centauri." It was sort of true, in a 'hey, go vamp for time with the big guy before he wanders out the door' kind of way.

Thor stared at her. "Proxima Centauri is a red dwarf star. The habitable zone of it is about a fingernail slice, and the only planetoid there with any remarkable life, well, all it really has worth mentioning is blindacre moss."

Daisy absorbed that.

"Good for poultices. It's a minor cargo, requires specialized-"

Daisy grimaced, putting up a hand to get him to stop. "I was… just cracking a joke, dude. It's cool. Thanks for the Fodor's Guide to the Galaxy, there, though. Interesting in a pretty boring way. I'll grab my towel and we can hit up the flyover country of the local star cluster sometime."

It was Thor's turn to look nonplussed. "It's not very touristy."

"Yeah, I got that." Daisy looked at the vending machine, then at him. "So, phones? It's good for a laugh and you'll feel like you're doing something. Breakfast starts at five am. The eggs are good and there's a lot of them."

Thor peered at her, his face telling her he knew this was all very suspicious in some harmless way. "You're working to distract me. Buy time."

Daisy shrugged. "Whether I am or not, it's going on ten. The best kooks always call after midnight. I'll sit with you. And if you wanna depression snack, dude, I know where these guys hide the Costco supernacho bags. Do _not_ eat the crap from those machines. No one in the galaxy is that desperate."


	5. Chapter 5

5.

. . .

Loki looked down at his phone as he left the corner office several hours later, reading the text message and baring his teeth meaninglessly. Coulson was ahead of him, looking as tired and bedraggled as he felt. His own head felt like it was full of spreadsheets and Excel-based schedules, and now the irritation was coming back afresh. "Well, that _was_ working out. But now I've got a Turkish diplomat that wants to shift their security appointment with me. Difficulty, their next open window is forty-five minutes after an appointment I've got with the Brussels team that I cannot move, and also there's the bit where, to even pull it off, I'd have to teleport without causing a scene."

"Kick it back to Mack. I think he's got a spare guy they can put on it."

"My tag is on all the damn forwards, they'll be looking for me specifically."

"We'll put a wig on the spare guy. We'll handle it." Coulson stopped before the elevator, waiting for it to open up. "Your brother's up on two."

Loki looked up from his phone, surprised. "What in Hel is he still doing here?"

"I had Daisy give him something to do while we figured out how to wiggle the schedule. I know you figured he'd wander off on the lightning fantastic while we did it, but we corralled him to save a step. Go talk to him." Loki was still staring down at him. "I don't care what you say to each other at first, but in my experience, if you just stay pissed off and he stays depressed and neither of you get to work on this immediately, everyone's gonna fester and you'll both just get madder and sadder. Same day action. I know you said it's alien to you. It really helps."

Loki rolled his eyes. "If you want to help, find me a cannon big enough to put an old king in."

"You know he's probably listening to you, right? He and Heimdall are probably sitting on a big, nasty, Asgardian couch eating Asgardian popcorn, getting husks in their teeth, and watching the family drama."

"That's really not how it works."

"Okay, probably not. But are you sure?"

The glower, set at a low simmer, said Loki wasn't, and also ' _screw you for lodging the possibility in my head_.'

Coulson grinned at him. "Daisy put him on the phone bank. They're usually getting the good calls right about now."

. . .

"Uhhh." Thor checked the printed routing list again, coming up empty on what to do and approaching the kind of bureaucratic desperation he typically tried his whole life to avoid. It was Loki's thing, and it struck him again with miserable force that he was most definitely trespassing in Loki's, well, realm.

He swiveled in the chair with the corded phone still pressed to his ear, looking for Miss Daisy. Daisy was on the far side of the room, talking to someone else with a giant cereal bowl cradled in their arms like a baby, and her back was to him. He swapped the phone to his other hand and felt around for something he could safely toss at her to get attention. Meanwhile, he fought for time to enable that rescue. His tone was conciliatory, genteel, and more than a little strained. "Madame. Madame?"

'Madame' was a rickety-sounding old woman who had just finished listening to a terribly exciting late night radio program, and the topic of the evening had struck a nerve inside her. Now she was looking for a target.

The voice in his ear continued to drone on angrily. He'd long since lost the thread of it.

"Madame, please. I'm looking for someone to connect you with, but I'm new here and I'm not quite sure of the procedure on, uh, ancient… astronauts." He shook his head, the next muttered to himself. "Least I'm _fairly_ certain none of us were in that part of Arkansas around then."

The voice kicked up a few decibels in his ear, implying that the old woman on the other line had nothing wrong with her hearing. Thor's hand fumbled across a stapler, then immediately let it go. No, he'd wind up accidentally putting staples all across the far wall. He needed something harmless. Something lighter.

The voice in his ear became somehow even more peevish, and something about the tone made it clear the woman thought he, personally, some anonymous figure answering a phone in the guts of a brutalist underground facility, was at fault. " _Sonny, I know you people at SHIELD are holding out on the world. We let you get away with this nonsense enough times, but my father served in the war and I can tell you… Well! We've known for a long time you people were holding back on something, and I want to speak to a supervisor and-_ "

With a thrill of victory, Thor fumbled across a rubber stress ball in a top drawer. Daisy could help him get this person off the damned line before he gave up and told her to take it up with the Kree and that he'd personally arrange the flight. Via Bifrost. No seatbelts or refunds.

He aimed for the girl, then calculated how much of his own strength to hold back.

The phone was very gently plucked from his hand. Thor froze, startled. "Terribly sorry. I'm the floor supervisor," came a drawling voice with just a hint of softly buffed gravel. "I see. I see. Well, I'll have one of my assistants take your concerns straight to the top. Can we send someone over to talk to you? Yes, ma'am. I've got a helicopter on standby right now. Yes, a black one. No, you don't think that's funny? _I_ do."

 _Click_.

"Oh my god, Loki." The sound of him abruptly hanging up got Daisy's attention away from her friend. Thor stayed where he was, silent, metaphorically sandwiched between the two agents, a slab of ham facing the deli slicer. "What did you do?"

"I handled a call." Loki sounded bored.

"What was her deal?"

"Ancient astronauts," managed Thor, still generally baffled with the whole thing. He looked up at the young woman.

"Oh." Daisy looked down at him, then at Loki. "Eh, forget it."

"She's not going to-"

Daisy patted Thor's shoulder. "Nah, dude. It's all good." She looked at the brothers again, clearly sensing a change in the wind. "I'm gonna go get coffee."

"You, uh, just went for coffee," said Thor.

Daisy looked into at her still-full mug, then back at him, chirping cheerfully. "Yup. Needs a warm-up. AC is real chilly up here."

The single bead of sweat on Thor's forehead determined that was a lie.

"Have fun, dudes!"

When she left, all that was left was the sound of a single squeaky wheel from the chair under Thor. It took what was either about ten seconds or fifty years before Thor looked up at Loki.

Loki was looking back at him with that deceptively mild, sedate expression that historically meant something else entirely, but Thor was never quite sure what that else was. The tone of voice was a perfect match. "I feel like we _just_ did this."

"Don't necessarily have to do it again. Uh, I was just… helping with the… calls." Thor gestured vaguely at the desk in front of him, still not quite sure what to think of his time as a phone bank grunt.

"Seems like it was educational."

"Is the whole planet this damned weird when I'm not looking?"

"Yes. I'm not sure if it's peculiarly charming, or if I've adapted into a new kind of madness to deal with it." Loki splayed his hand on the surface of the desk, using it to prop himself in an awkward looking lean. Thor still couldn't read the truth of his expression. "I'm not apologizing."

"Loki, I don't need one." Thor sighed as the chair squeaked again. He rolled a few inches, circling lightly. "I knew it would be difficult to talk to you, considering."

"And you tried anyway." Still that mild, neutral tone. Gods, Thor hated that voice. It was obviously why he was using it. "Interesting."

"Anyway." Thor rolled the chair back towards the desk, wincing as the squeak hit a new high point. "I didn't mean to intrude. Miss Daisy explained a little of what's going on, and knowing that human politics can be, well, a bit complicated, I-"

"I've adjusted my schedule somewhat." The words came out flat enough to hit Thor like a brick. Loki wasn't looking at him any longer. "You'll have to deal with the fact that I'm going to be attached to my phone like an Arcturian prickle-boar, but I can travel in _short_ bursts. Short, I emphasize. Humanly short. Daytripping, as Coulson put it." Loki sighed, heavy and put upon and deliberately dramatic. "When you came here, you implied you had some ideas on how to proceed further on your personal investigation?"

"Er, yes."

"And you were looking for help."

"I was, Loki, but-"

"It's fine." It mostly sounded like it was, the calm, flat brick of Loki's voice softening a bit. The wheel squeaked again. The AC continued to be nonexistent. "Does any of this end with drop-kicking Odin over a valley?"

Thor couldn't help sounding amused. This was the quickest the family strife had settled down. That was remarkable. Humans. Gods, he loved them. "I thought you two were generally making up."

"We are. It doesn't mean I am not going to feel the exhaustion to the marrow of my bones when I find out he's long-term ruined something else for everyone. Again." Loki straightened up. "That said, I still know a lovely old folks home. He quite liked playing gin rummy there, I was told. The nurses liked him. Life was simpler. Do it right, it'll be simpler for all of us this time."

Thor chuckled, the small awkward laugh of a man that knows he shouldn't laugh at that in any public setting but damned if he didn't sort of understand even if he didn't entirely approve.

"Get away from that stupid desk before that one idiot calls in about demon possessed guinea pigs again. We'll discuss this after I make a quick visit back downstairs."

. . .

Mack didn't often get to hang with people in his own general height range at SHIELD. It was one of the odder reasons he never minded being on a job with Loki. Fewer neck kinks, same exhaustion at the creaky old 'how's the weather up there' jokes, and the guy was always solid backup when things got hot.

Bringing Thor in made him feel the rarest of emotions: vaguely intimidated. But only vaguely. Still wearing a handful of denim items that had been the fashion rage in '84, and looking a bit awkward next to his adopted brother, Thor seemed perfectly willing to seem like a generic, if heroically massive, dude for a few minutes. He leaned against a far wall, quiet, watching Loki work.

"So you've got Martens on the Turkish thing?" Loki curled a piece of paper by way of turning a page. The pen in his other hand scratched across that next page.

"Yeah, Coulson's signing it out. If they give us guff at the hand-off, I'll kick it to him. He just texted me to say he's getting ready to put the screws on Talbot to give us some more manpower on this, too. Said something about how this is why he builds up patience with the guy. Gives him currency when it matters."

"Having to look at that haircut would be painful enough to warrant some wriggle, I'd think." Another pen scratch, another dotted line. "In any case, better he deal with Talbot than I."

"Yeah, some of your, uh, past talks with Director Mace have already passed into legend." Mack paused for a moment of silence. In the end, he'd liked Mace a surprising amount. The man had tried his best with what he had. Nothing about how the Framework had gone down, what scars it left behind, was fair. "So, where you guys jaunting off to first? Anyplace cool?"

"I don't know," said Loki. "I just threw myself at this fairly blindly, which is the tradition in our family." His voice raised to carry over his shoulder. "Where _are_ we going?"

"Alfheim."

Loki froze, his mental DVR stuck on a very visible pause. Mack watched the blankness fill his eyes before he shook it off again. " _Alfheim_?" He turned to look at Thor, the pen hanging loose in his hand. "I haven't been there since mage training for a few decades at one of the academies, and I don't think you've ever been."

Thor shrugged with his arms crossed. "Their scholars keep duplicates of certain of our more important texts, among other storages."

"So they do…" Loki glanced at Mack as if he had any sort of input he could add to this.

Mack looked back, doing his best to telepathically get across that he was already half mentally jettisoned out of this conversation due to his own complete lack of usefulness. Half. It was still pretty interesting to rubberneck it.

"They supposedly have a copy of Asgard's genealogies. One I can actually access without going through Odin."

"Oh my gods, you wanted me along to help with _library work_." Loki frowned. Mack took a reasonable guess that he was reassessing why he sounded affronted. "All right, fair."

That left another question. "What's in Alfheim? Small furry dudes that eat cats?"

Both men looked at Mack, blank.

"Okay, real old reference. Kinda surprised they haven't rebooted it yet. Anyway. Asgard's got human-style godpeople, Jotunheim's giants, what's Alfheim?"

"Elves," said Loki, with a slight undertone of distaste.

Thor furrowed his brow. "I always thought you liked them well enough, Loki."

"Most people there are fine. The bureaucracy is shit, the academies are nothing _but_ bureaucracy now, and while they made the correct choice allowing the Tuatha and the Oberonese refugees there during the Midgardian Fey Sundering a few centuries ago, Oberon himself has apparently just been an _absolute_ pain in the ass to everyone. It's no surprise his wife left him." Loki shook his head. "You missed Odin's screaming fit four hundred and seventy-three years ago, didn't you?"

"Er." Thor cleared his throat. "You know they all tend to run together after a point."

"Yeah, an Oberonese emissary was trying to make a power play behind Queen Aelsa's back." Loki sounded tired. "Not a rare thing in Alfheim. It's been a tradition for millennia. This one went just great for Oberon. He got out of prison last century. The realms' leaders are all on tenterhooks for his next stupid stunt. They're overdue."

"Um."

On the bright side, Thor looked as lost as Mack felt. He tried to cut in. "So is any of that going to cause a problem for you two?"

"We'll find out." Loki shut the folder he'd been finalizing his signatures in. "One thing's for certain, I expect I won't be seeing any less paperwork on _this_ leg of the trip."


	6. Chapter 6

6.

. . .

Alfheim. Rolling green hills nestled among beautifully frosted mountain caps, and among them were hidden pockets of eternal spring. Underneath those were the secret hot pools, sources of ancient water magics. Elemental salamanders played tag with the undine above, creating waterspouts and fountains for the tiny fae that drifted by to watch. Far to the north the air became more crisp, and there the ice-bound, enchanted elves sworn to the study of more dangerous elements, lived among stone basilisks and the feral winged saberfae cats. To the south lived the woodland elves who kept the green, an old offshoot of an ancient people. They kept old traditions alive - and maintained a pretty good tourism industry off of it.

And in the pockmarked rest of the realm, the mirror-gleam of the Elvish cities, sparkling crystal of countless colors, a riot of delight and joy, where the wind created song as it breezed by spiraled steeples shaped for exactly these effects.

The spaceport, and the postage stamp of field where by Nine Realms law they allowed the Bifrost to land, were stuffed in a perpetually gloomy canyon where the locals never had to witness them. It would have been gauche.

Loki, a crow in elegant blacks and the barest flash of green, stood hunched and annoyed as a flock of wee pixies drifted by him, stardust flickering in their wake. "Gaudy," he said with terse finality. He looked up at the sprawling complex before them, a palace of knowledge built from trillions of shards of glass on the edge of that bright city.

Thor was in a draped tunic of various soft browns, with a red cloak clasped loosely off his shoulder and his hip. He didn't say anything to Loki's verdict. Faced with his first real view of Alfheim - he wasn't against knowledge or magic by any stretch of the imagination, but his preferences tended to be more practical - he found he agreed.

Both men looked severely out of place.

Tall, lithe Elves with flowing hair knotted up with gilded strings and jingling gems all but glided on mossy cobblestones, stared at the pair outright as they passed, then away with politeness, mild faces allowing a microsneer that Loki didn't miss, as he was looking for more reasons to be already annoyed with them all.

"Did you think it was gaudy when you studied here?"

"I found it dazzling for about a week, and then I realized a great deal of the spectacle was surface level. There are some of the finest sorcerers, enchanters, and historians in all the galaxy here, Thor, and not a damn one of them lives within capital limits. That's how you know they're wise." Loki paused as another gaggle drifted past, these ones watching pirated space dramas on handheld crystalline holovid displays. "But if you want some of the most asinine, uptight, priggish sticklers for legalese this side of a Midgardian homeowner's association, you come to the shadow of the palace." He glanced at Thor. "I will say the royal family themselves are rather nice. It's a shame, really. The council has it all but zipped up."

Thor took that in, watching the locals watching them. "Is it bad I hope you're being overly negative?"

"Believe it or not, I would love nothing more than to be wrong about the politics of the fair folk. The good bits are marvelous. The vast majority of the people beyond the palace are fascinating, often kind. It wasn't a terrible term that I spent here. And I have nothing ill to say about the food."

"Speaking of."

"No food or drink in the library." Loki said it flatly. "There's fines associated with it, if you can call it something so small as a _fine_. But this is after they hold you for about a week to assess particle damage to any tomes within a certain radius, after which they consult a booksage to see if any future damage has been hastened, at which point-"

"Thank you, Loki, I think I've got the shape of it."

"Lead on, then." Loki gestured at the library. "I'll run back-up." He grinned, no humor in it. "You'll need it."

. . .

The first problem was navigating the chain of no less than eight different librarians and keepers shuffling them from desk to desk for proper authorization to access the section they wanted. That they were princes of Asgard cut zero ice or red tape - there was a routine, and for the safety of all realms and their knowledge, the elves were going to stand by it. Thor gamely followed along, and it took a good forty-five minutes before they got the actual archivist they needed.

Thor mostly only saw the top of their head. The archivist was otherwise ensconced behind a high, ornate desk that seemed more like a tiny, open-air cell. Milky-white hair braided with equally white leather straps, a handful of clear gems, and, to spice it up, a single mark of smokey quartz high on the brow where the hair met a trace of coppery skin, and now and again came the occasional mutter of 'mmhhm. Mhhhh—hm."

The soft scent of leather, lavender, and ancient paper filled the air. There were no other sounds but the rustling of the work, and that faint, insistent mutter. Thor tried to not shift his weight, fearing even that noise would echo in the cavernlike halls. Loki seemed nigh invisible. There were moments Thor wasn't even sure he was still there. He didn't dare move to peek.

"Mmm—hm…"

Thor prepared to clear his throat to gain the elf's attention, stopping when Loki leaned forward to catch his eye. A single soft shake of his head, and Loki leaned back again.

Well, what the hel was he _supposed_ to do?

"Hmmmmm. Your highnesses."

Thor nearly jumped out of his skin. A single eye was now peeking at him from above the lip of the desk, sharp and green. A handful of thin wrinkles surrounded it, that Elvish rarity, and Thor realized that whoever this archivist was, he was showing a trace of age.

"I apologize for the wait, your highnesses."

Thor and Loki inclined their heads politely.

The archivist peeked over a little more, then read and reread the note signed by some eight other librarians that had been left in front of him.

"Hmmm."

Thor was, not to put a fine point on it, calculating how close he was to losing his shit. It had now been over an hour from entering the door to this moment.

"We did our best to expedite your request."

 _They did what now_? A low noise rattled in Thor's throat, a stillborn laugh. He locked eyes with Loki as he took a silent step forward to come equal with him. Loki looked pretty far past done himself.

"Unfortunately…"

Both Thor's eyebrows crawled up to his hairline in an aching _yeeeeeessss_?

"We are unable to provide access to the genealogies at this time."

Thor could _feel_ the handle of a hammer in his hand for a single glimmering second.

"Beg your pardon, High Archivist Milkmane." Loki stepped in front of Thor, smooth and calm. "As these copies of the genealogies are Asgardian property entrusted to your care, we are legally unable to accept any sort of unreasonable delay to our request. Please understand, that's not my word, merely a reference to the accord we signed in… mmm… Aelf 4032, as witnessed by Archivist Silvergleam and a factor for All-Father Bor Burison."

With an almost absurd, religious sense of mercy, Thor thought to himself: _Thank Gods for Loki_.

"Mmmmmm…."

"I am terribly afraid and most apologetic that I must therefore insist that we be offered access as promptly as is, of course, reasonable."

Thor watched that sharp green eye twitch. The other eye came up to match, and now he properly saw the man. He was indeed as ancient as an Elf might rarely be, that perfect, almost metallic skin marred by a handful of wrinkles not only by the eyes but by the mouth. A chill went down Thor's back.

The Elves loved beauty and perfection, but they had an almost paradoxical love as well for the flow of time, their place within and above it, and so, Thor had read when he was a child, if an Elf pushed through that odd, melancholic age to become truly _old_ , they were then revered in society as a speaker of wisdoms, a beacon of time itself. Loki would know more about this particular bit of sociology, and Thor knew by his careful tone that he was very gently pushing it.

This was not a man with which to fuck, to put it as baldly as the humans might.

The religious gratitude became a trace of holy fear. _Loki, please tell me you know what you're doing_.

Loki looked firm and serene. He didn't so much as twitch. High Archivist Milkmane shifted in his seat a minute later, the detente broken somehow. "Ayelah."

Another elf appeared as if from the air itself. She was taller than either brother, with sky blue skin and steely hair. Her voice lilted in a low and harmonic set of chords, practiced to carry through the library without disrupting it. "Archivist."

"Explain to them."

Ayelah bowed low as Archivist Milkmane abruptly departed his desk. "I accept the shame so that our Archivist may not be burdened by it." She bowed again. "We are unable to offer you access to the genealogies as you deserve."

"And why not?" Loki interlaced his fingers, playing up the diplomatic role.

"The royal tomes are… damaged." Ayelah straightened up, but looked neither man in the eye. She looked pained. "This was discovered only an hour ago, when your request was entered in the system."

"What do you mean _damaged_?" Thor was shocked. At first. Then it began to melt away into something far more familiar.

"They seem to be vandalized."

Loki put a hand on Thor's arm, seeming to sense his growing anger. "I would like us to examine them anyway."

A more pressing observation struck Thor. "Who saw them last?"

Ayelah shuddered, as if that was a breach of some kind. The quick look he got from Loki suggested it was exactly that. "I am afraid that our visitor records are under Elvish protectorate and cannot be shared, save under explicit circumstances."

"It's all right. We'll worry about that later." Loki smoothed it over with a wave. "Still, I would like us to study the damage ourselves."

Ayelah seemed to pause, then scraped another fast, unreadable look over the two men. "Of course, your highnesses. If you will follow me into the next ward."

. . .

The genealogies of the Noble Houses of Asgard were collected in large tomes of burgundy leather strapped with gold. Each era or family line had their own sub-collection, with the royal family kept on a central display dais as ornate and gilded and overwrought as the books themselves. The aesthetic of this particular room was familiar to Thor, comfortable. A taste of Asgard hidden in another world.

Ayelah bowed next to the central dais, waved her hands towards the books as if presenting a seated noble to their equal, and then stepped away to allow them to approach.

"Are all of them damaged?" Loki asked her.

"One only, my lord. Volume Six of the High Name." She watched, wincing once as Loki put his hand on it.

Thor came up alongside Loki. "Don't tell me. Let me guess."

"Don't even waste your time with that." Loki glanced at him, sidelong. "Of course he's enough of an ass to arrange to secure any information we could access. At this point, it's really just seeing how he did it. To his credit, I don't think he sent anyone in here with a bottle of black ink and a lighter."

Loki flipped the tome open. The books were bound in the classic style, a heavy cord threaded underneath the leather. The pages made of fine parchment and gave off a soft, powdery smell as the pages turned. The tomes weren't just basic records, they covered intimate detail and specifics a normal genealogy might not. A book of family secrets. It wasn't difficult to find what was wrong, the surgical gap easily discovered just behind the back cover. Ayelah seemed to shrink in the corner. Loki, courteously, seemed to not notice. "Everything from Bor Burison to now."

"Naturally." Thor tried to not let his seething anger into the air.

"It was a good idea, Thor. Uncomplicated, to the point, and strategic." Loki didn't sound remotely condescending. "Hel, I forget we _have_ other copies outside the palace library. Me. And I have access to Omnipotence City." Loki shut the book again. "Shame they won't have another set of spares. What I particularly like is that if we found the missing pages, the book can be repaired good as new. How _thoughtful_."

Ayelah did not look like she agreed with his sardonic observation, but she kept silent.

"Scholar Ayelah, would we be remiss to ask, not for specifics, but to know roughly how long ago the last visitor to this room was?"

Ayelah pressed her palms together. Silence filled the air. Thor suddenly realized there were no dust motes. Only pure light, their voices, and the soft smell of the books. The whole facility was enchanted somehow in addition to the imported Dwarvish filters he'd seen expertly hidden in the walls. Some intense use of magical energy, all to keep and preserve their treasures. There were no temples in the city, he'd noticed. Vaguely, he knew there were small shrines instead, all around the realm.

But there was this library at the heart of it.

All right, thought Thor. No wonder all these elves look like they're about to have a stroke over a scratched page.

"It was well over a thousand years ago, my lords. I do not wish to clarify further, for the sake of our policies. But I would avow to that much, having checked the records before attending the High Archivist."

"Er," said Loki, visibly taken off guard by that answer. "All right, I was expecting something more like 'last week,' but, all right." He absorbed that, looking at Thor.

Thor looked back, just as surprised. It meant the vandalism likely wasn't a result of his new, furious curiosity. So what the hel did _that_ mean?

Loki frowned, then reached out to grip Thor's arm, hard. "Ayelah, I'll be speaking privately a moment."

"Of course." She drifted away to the far corner of the room, giving them space.

"Thor, why did you think to check the genealogies? What put you in this direction?"

"Surprised you didn't ask earlier."

"I decided to shut up and make a play at being usefully supportive since my first response was so tetchy. What did you find?"

Thor shrugged. "A handful notes in my history, in the healerie. After one of my last battles. There was a minor emergency in another ward, they left me with the paperwork. So I looked." Thor shook his head. "I found… references to something coded in my birth record. A few other correlated notes that were sealed. I tried to crack them, got nothing. Tried to crack Father, nothing. So I left."

"Fuck me."

Thor blinked at him, surprised.

Loki grinned back, humorlessly. "I never thought to look at my medical records, can you believe that? I could have snuck in anytime, found some piece of similar coding - who knows, a file marked 'blueberry' - asked questions…"

"Loki…" Thor knew what he thought he knew, didn't know how to say it, except in the raw, truthful way. "I think you were afraid of finding out. That you might be right. Until it was forced onto you."

Something almost invisible traced across Loki's face. It wasn't quite hurt. A sting, maybe. "Perceptive. You're learning." He looked away. "Anyway. All right. Then why not just falsify the record? It wouldn't be hard to cover a lie, and they would have had to for me. I've never gotten to Odin's copies, either, but I can't imagine the truth about Laufey was in there. So why the total removal of this copy's section? Just lie. If the truth was at one point in your record, come in with a pen and 'adjust' it."

"The tomes are meant to be enchanted. The words may _not_ be changed, and the words in them must be true. I'm not even sure how they managed a removal, we must investigate this. But if they had tried a replacement, breaking any of that enchantment? It would have taken days. Perhaps weeks to accomplish. We never would have allowed someone to remain here with the books that long. Not a king nor a god, and both have tried." Both men looked at Ayelah, who pressed her hands together and looked to the ground. "My apologies, Highnesses. Your words _are_ private, on our Queen's brow and Light. I may speak nothing of what I overhear. But I could not leave this sanctum unattended… and your question seemed important."

The brothers glanced at each other, mutually agreeing to let it go. "Then… I don't know," said Thor.

"This was it, your big plan? Find your birth record and stomp back to Asgard with it in hand?"

"I…" Thor sighed. "Not exactly. Those codes in my records, I wrote them down."

"That's not going to get you anywhere much on their own."

"No, but I thought with at least some information about my birth from the tomes, I could try to figure out what nurses were in attendance. What realms they came from, get an idea for more code breaking attempts. There's analysts around the galaxy. Xandar, a few other places. I ran into a few potential information brokers on Sakaar when I left Asgard, took notes."

Loki nodded, looking annoyed with himself. "Better plan than I assumed, which is on me."

"But without even a trace of that information…." Thor gestured at the books. "I don't dare try to break into Odin's halls."

Something quirked across Loki's face. "It's a last option, to be sure."

"You make it sound like it _is_ an option."

"Not… really." Loki winced. Then something abruptly tweaked across his face, bright and savagely alert. He snapped his fingers, then pointed at Ayelah. "Records. Other records."

"Your highness?"

"We entrusted other papers to Alfheim's libraries. Diplomatic records. Court transcripts. Proclamations. I need access to those."

Ayelah shook her head. "I cannot help you, your highness."

Loki went deathly still.

"They are kept at a different facility."

"Oh, thank gods," he blurted, relieved. "I can deal with that. Do you know which one?"

"I can find out."


	7. Chapter 7

7.

. . .

The secure SHIELD text and mail app sat at the bottom of the phone display's dock. In the upper right corner of the icon was a number. It read 117.

117 unread messages.

The number mocked Loki. He couldn't stab a number. It would be unwise to stab the phone, if deeply satisfying. For a single second, so real he could almost feel the perfumed breeze of this alternate moment in time, he watched himself fling the damn thing out the window of the carriage taking him and his brother to the edge of a nearby Elvish town. It sailed forward, over the heads of the silently racing winged cats, long-furred and lovely in twining golden bridles, and over the glinting ridge into one of the cool springs below.

He blinked and the phone still sat in his clenching hand, its bright display judging him relentlessly.

119 unread messages.

"Fuck," he said under his breath, and he got to speed-reading to be sure he wasn't missing anything important.

. . .

"It's positively Sisyphean," complained Loki as he unfurled himself from the carriage, never looking away from the phone in his hand. "Every time I finish reading a message, several more pop in. Thank _gods_ we haven't set up a Slack server yet, I think that might be the thing to finally end me."

"I know what most of those words mean," said Thor, bemused.

Loki looked up at that, seeing Thor squint against the evening sun. "I assume you want to get a meal first."

"Wouldn't mind. When do you need to get back to Earth?"

"I just have to check into the server by their midnight. There's an out of time zone videocall I need to be in on despite it being a complete waste of time - it's idiotic, it's a bunch of pointless whinging about security patrols, for gods' sake, scheduled for halls that are still being finished so none of it even matters yet - and then I need a nap, but at least I don't have to go back for any of it. Just stick me in a moderately secure inn room and ignore the screams until I pass out or figure out how to remote-kill about fifteen people."

"You're exaggerating."

"Course I am." Loki arched an eyebrow. "Not about the screaming bit, though. The mute button is ruddy invaluable. I'll try to harden the room, too. Don't want to bother the other guests."

"Right." Thor turned to gesture at the compact, rather homey looking town. Compared to the city's crystalline vibrancy, this place stayed on the edge of an untouched wood. Vines created organic landscapes along stone walls and hutches, with firmer structures apparently grown out of the trees themselves. It seemed rather sparse, and doubt crept into his voice. "Do you know anything about this place?"

"Verdurois. One of the older towns. It's much more than you think. Look up. Not towards the horizon, but here."

Thor turned his head towards where Loki gestured, wrinkling his nose at the sprawling foliage and the interlocking canopies where leaves grew thick as moss and were broken only by the twinkling light of the sky peeking through. He saw nothing else at first, glanced at Loki, then looked again.

Like a puzzle painting, it abruptly snapped together for him this time. The twinkling lights were not the sky, but rainbow glimmers within windows grown into the tall trees. The foliage hid more rooftops, if not _were_ part of the roofs themselves, and a moment later the soft rustling sounds of the leaves became the quiet night noises of a town at peace. Songbirds flittered along the staircases, and nests nestled on the rungs of ladders that at first brush seemed more ornamental than useful. "…That's beautiful." His voice was soft.

"Rather is. As I say, didn't care for the capital much. The towns are far nicer. I'm not familiar with this one, but I _think_ that's a pub over there on the right. In the broad elm."

"As part of the tree trunk itself." Thor blinked, still surprised. "Not one of the ones on the ground."

"No, anyplace on the ground is going to be for punters and tourists with a fear of heights. If you want anything decent 'round the old woods, you go up." Loki shrugged. "I expect this other archive is probably back in the dense copse, too, sloping towards the ancient growth. And if luck holds, it'll be run by the sane and sensible sorts. Not as much bureaucracy, maybe even a modern filing system. Easy stuff, if dull."

"And what do you expect to find there?"

"As I said to the girl. Diplomatic records and proclamations. Look for the documents surrounding your birth, up to a year before. There will have been celebrations, moots, discussions about the young prince and heir the moment the realms knew one was about to land. We look at those. Look for the birth announcements. Find out who's still around that might have been there in Asgard - which factors, which ambassadors. Chase _them_ down and see if we can't crack your coding system. Or maybe even get some outright answers."

Thor looked at his brother with an old, familiar admiration. "Loki, that's perfect."

Loki grinned back at him, a smile that seemed to come forward through time from those years when they both were young. "I know."

. . .

Of all the things Thor had been surprised by in his life, the sight of a small, spritely waiter clad in a fine teal tunic that looked handwoven and hand embroidered, trotting up to them with a nano-graphene digiscroll curled in his hand was getting right up there on the list. Many of the realms had learned to traffic with the wider universe over the years, Nidavellir of note diversifying their booze and metals portfolio into the delicate politics of being a very upscale galactic arms dealer - underwritten by Asgard, of course. But the woodland elves had always seemed more… withdrawn to him on paper than even the light elves of the city.

Loki caught his look after the man left with their order. "Rural elves honor the ancient ways by paradoxically modernizing when useful, because they got the idea a couple hundred years back that the efficiency and waste reduction was actually helping them prioritize the local ecology."

Thor tried to square that with the city they'd just left. "So what's with the capita-"

" _Aesthetics_." The word came with a sneer. "Did you really ignore the whole section on Elf politics when we were children?"

"On the scale of interest in the Nine, Loki, I confess that where you once had Midgard sitting right on the bum of it, I had Alfheim. If it was outside the basic overviews and it didn't involve people I had to bow to later, I may have glazed over somewhat." Thor shrugged, looking apologetic. "My mistake."

"Fair." Loki watched another three messages roll onto the screen of his phone and winced a little. "I slept through the course on early human evolution and it's honestly bizarre how often that comes up. Particularly since I also missed a related Kree seminar or two and now I'm nearly as confused by the newly hybridized Inhumans as anyone at work. Goes to show you."

"Do they export anything here?"

"Biological materials, mostly. Lots of desired but sustainable medical components come from the forests around here. I… _think_ there's a sap that gets barreled for those easy-repair ship kits. Artisanal wood for galactic hipsters." Loki leaned back as the waiter returned with the plate of food. "Ah."

Thor studied the tray when the waiter was gone. A small but lovely assortment of cheeses, a handful of artfully arrayed pieces of meat, a tiny bowl of vegetables, and a side plate of thinly baked breads. "Loki." He made sure to sound worried.

"What?"

"You should have told us."

"Told you _what_?" Loki stared at him, confused.

"That the Elves were starving you when you studied here." Thor grinned, having gotten away with what he thought was a pretty decent joke.

"Oh, gods." Loki picked a pickled stonefruit out of the bowl and chucked it at him, ignoring the look he got from an individual swathed in silky, webby veils seated in a nearby corner. "Uh oh, I'm offending that orbweaver _aes sidhe_."

"The whowhat?" Thor craned around the edge of their booth.

"Don't stare, it's rude, and my ankle is already itching in anticipation." Loki loaded a cracker-like triangle of bread with a carefully chosen selection from the tray. "She'll put spiders on you if she feels like it."

Thor whipped back around in his seat and began to silently eat with the same well-trained royal delicacy. Snakes, he loved the slinky buggers. Spiders were not his pals, however. Spiders were cagey, hungry little bastards that liked dark places - places like his boots - and were not to be trusted.

The rest of the meal was, as far as the Odinson family reckoned such things, bizarrely quiet.

. . .

Somewhere in the mix of another batch of jumbled, terse messages on Loki's phone was a notification that the videocall conference was off. Ten messages later, it was back on and moved up a half hour. Then it was off again. Maybe.

Loki reloaded the mailbox, shifting a little where he sat crosslegged on a cozy woven blanket stretched across the loamy inn floor. It was finally empty, at the one time he could use a definitive answer as to what the hell was going on back at the office. He looked up at the faint sound of someone passing through the hall beyond his room, marked whoever it was automatically as not-Thor and not-threat, and then flicked to the spam mailbox to be sure he hadn't missed anything.

Then he refreshed the box again. Nothing. His thumb wavered over the call button, pausing as he tried to determine how much he actually wanted to talk to another person now that he was finally in a quiet, peaceful place for the first time in days, and then hit the call.

" _Y'ella_." Mack sounded half-dead, though he still picked up within two rings. " _The vidcall, right?_ "

"That."

" _It's off._ " Loki almost heard the irritated expression. " _There was some scheduling thing, then a cross-language muff-up, then there was something else… whatever. It was a mess. Ask me, I think an intern forgot to tell a dude how late this thing was going to happen and he went around and tanked the whole call last minute in favor of sleeping._ "

"There but for the grace of Gods go we."

" _I know, right?_ " A huge, jaw-cracking yawn filled the line.

"Go rest, Mackenzie. I'll check in by text tomorrow." Loki took the phone away from his ear at the sound of another footstep beyond. Still no one important. He frowned. "I'll be back in person the next day regardless, handle another round of papers."

" _Right. All good out there?_ "

"It's about as expected. Go sleep." Loki rang off and stared at the twining, thick branches that made up the wall of the room. Something seemed off, a little jarred somehow, something he couldn't put a finger on. But then, that was the way of life these days. It was no doubt nothing but his tired, distracted mind. Better he get some rest. By morning, he was sure, all hell would break loose again.

. . .

"You're an Asgardian, sir." A tankard, a proper large one full to near-dripping, of honeyed mead dropped onto the table before Thor. "My best regards to you and your homeland, good visitor."

Thor looked at the surprise gift, then at the smiling Elf that had brought it. A tall and pretty fellow, spindly and wrapped in greys that looked simple enough at first. Until Thor noticed the intricate layering and the fine, twinkling threads that set the grey to a cloudlike sparkle when the candlelight flickered right. A nobleman of some kind. The fine, triangular face seemed to wink entire down at him. "A good way to introduce yourself."

"Not that I've quite done so, yet, sir. My name is Leamhan. Your companion left and the table seemed far too empty, so I thought I might offer hospitality."

"It's welcomed." Thor pulled the mug closer to him, giving it an appreciative sniff. "I am Thor."

" _Thor_?" The Elf flung a hand to his chest, dropping onto the bench across from him with a poleaxed expression that looked just as lovely on that well-made face. Leamhan quickly rose again, less elegant than his first motions. He looked humbled. "Your Highness, I had no idea. I'm sorry for my familiarity."

Thor laughed with a short wave of his hand. "Please, no. I'm not much for noble games these days."

"Aye, no small number of your recent adventures are legend already. The humans are fond of you." Leamhan looked wistful. "So long since the Sundering. I've hardly seen the lands of my mothers since I was a child, not with my own eyes."

"You're fae? I thought you Elf." Thor bobbed his head. "Not to be disrespectful, nor to remark on things not my business."

"It's no trouble at all. My mother and her mother were fae-born, and when the choice to cross came 'bout, she - and I, young - followed her lover to these new shores." Leamhan grinned. "She does well at his side from then to now, and I've nothing to complain of. But still, there's something in the blood that remembers the old mounds of our forebears and wishes to go home."

"Aye, that's something I think I understand." Thor took a drink of the mead, names named and matters seeming fair enough. He wasn't fool enough anymore to take mysterious food or drink at random, Asgardian hardiness notwithstanding, but an elf poisoning a prince in a public pub seemed farfetched. "It's excellent."

"Local, of course. The brewers court a nearby bee-Queen and her kith not far from here, and with the tithe they earn they make a batch of this particular brew twice a century."

A lot of that sounded not particularly normal to Thor, who had also mostly slept through the overview of an introductory session on hive-keeping and other types of apiculture, but all right, he'd go with it. "I laud them," he said, going for generally complimentary. "Nothing like it in Asgard." That part was completely true.

Leamhan dipped his head once, quickly. Then some flicker of worry passed across his face. "You haven't been approached without your invitation by others yet, have you?"

"We've not, no." Thor studied him, wondering why the sudden change in mood.

Relief came next. "Thank gods. Your traveling companion is a dour-looking fellow, it likely deters them." Leamhan leaned in, blinking rapidly. "Compa-I'm a damned _fool_. Both princes!" He shook his head as Thor rumbled a chuckle. "I'd be in trouble with my betters if I let slide I slipped that. Well, that would do it, speaking of such legends. No one would dare try to ploy the trickster prince without a lot of risk and a fair cup of foolishness in hand. That is good. Very good."

"Is something going on we have not seen?"

" _Always_ , highness." Leamhan rolled his eyes. "There's always something going on in sweet Alfheim."

The man's aggravation sounded much like Loki's. Thor couldn't resist a new grin.

"There are, well, factions that look for sympathy from the unaware. An Asgardian, our good patrons and protectors, well, that would be irresistible to try and sway. And the Odinsons - a treasure incalculable."

Thor leaned back, drinking the mead at a comfortable pace. "My brother did make me aware that such things were afoot. He's indeed quite knowledgeable about such things."

"Thank goodness."

"The Oberonese, I was told." Thor continued to watch Leamhan as the man winced. "Often up to something at the fringes of the Queen's watch."

"They _are_." Leamhan leaned back, a flutter of relief creeping in. "Well, thank Gods and grass and all the springtime leaves. I've no need to worry over our land's guests being harangued this time." He shook his head. "It's wearying, I tell you."

"You're a watchman?"

"Ehh. What you might call an intelligence serviceman, in service to my lady. Fortunately I am rarely needed to be sly, for I have too much fashion sense to pretend to be what I'm not."

"You and Loki might get along."

"Or not, you never know with us types." The angular face did that full-wink again, just as at introduction. "May I impress upon you a single favor, your highness?"

"As prince of Asgard, sir, if there's something I could do to help the security of your realm, I must pledge my hand." Thor finished off the mead and set the mug aside.

"Oh, nothing so grand. Just… if someone does try to meddle in your affairs, do let me know." Leamhan pressed a single blue gem onto the tabletop. "This whistlestone will pass me a message. Anything odd you encounter, any strange word. Let it be my problem and none of yours."

An old artifact, but a familiar enough type. Thor reached out and put a single fingertip along the cabochon surface of the stone. It was warm to the touch. He'd have Loki look at it in the morning, to be sure it was safe. Thor suspected it was. This man seemed forthright enough. "Of course, friend Leamhan."

"I'll let you to your night, then. A warm and pleasant one, and with another tankard of good mead sent over." Leamhan slipped out of the booth with a final bob of his head.

It was indeed very good mead.


	8. Chapter 8

8.

. . .

"I'm not going to go over this again. For the last time. It's _not_ Doom." Loki didn't pace so much as whip with feral agitation back and forth through the conference room. "Listen to me. He fell from Sanctuary. Yes, I do think he survived. Further, the reason I believe he's not gone forever is that he stunk of sulfur and void as he fell. Yes, void magic has a _smell_ , don't give me that look, Coulson. Nothingness leaves the traces of bitter cold, empty as nothing else is. It scars reality, leaves that trail. Imagine an old ice pack sitting in a freezer too long - like that. He fell, and I believe he survived because he made some sort of pact with things I do not recommend, and further, he is _not in Latveria_ making our lives difficult in these subtle but building ways because _nothing_ with that specific stench is currently on Earth."

He stopped moving and snapped around to glower at his teammates. "And don't even try to tell me he's going to get cellular reception in Hell. _I_ enchanted my own phone and _I_ can't get more than two bars of 4G in _fucking_ _Asgard_."

Coulson folded his hands atop each other, shifted behind the old plywood table where he was sitting with Mack, a handful of assigned agents, and Daisy as a matter of assistant management, raised a single eyebrow halfway up his forehead, and said, "Okay."

Loki tried to shove his hands in the pockets of his usual hoodie, realized he was still wearing the smoothly layered tunic he'd been wearing when he got the emergency call that morning in Alfheim, sneered, snapped his fingers, and then put his hands in the pockets of his usual hoodie. His expression dared the rest of the room to say something about it.

No one did. He looked like he hadn't slept much. Loki took a breath, tried to sound more calm. "So, all right. I respect Wakanda's intelligence. Highly. They got wind of _something_ , I've absolutely no arguments there. I would submit rather than focus on the Latverian-suggestive elements in play that we look _around_ the matter and see who would have the ability to portray their interference convincingly - and why anyone would bother."

"Chaos is its own benefit." Daisy piped up from her end of the table. "I hear you say that like twice a month. Chaos on the political stage can be like money, especially in a region that's already off-balance. If you know who you're poking and what sorts of crap will happen 'cause of it, you're already winning the game." She looked at the rest of the table. "Half of the EU is dealing with Brexit fallout, and the rest is dealing with right wing nationalism on the rise. It's a hot crock pot of trouble. Throw in an ice cube and crap starts spitting all over."

"She pays attention." Loki glanced at Coulson. "Also, I'm still an awful influence."

Coulson saw his shot and took it with a grin. "I respect your intelligence, and I don't have any arguments there."

Loki rolled his eyes. "Very well. So. We have a UN meeting centered on both the Baltic and Balkan regions and their destabilized role in the union post-Doom. It is now in a high state of panic because someone is continually pulling the alarm and trying to tell us that deadly interference in this summit is likely to happen. We've got multiple lines of inquiry that say that someone is most definitely planning an attack either on the summit itself or is content to disrupt matters until it simply never happens. We are getting valid information about that interference that needs constant attention and resources. That in itself isn't useful or strange."

"But someone's wearing us down with it." Mack piped up. "That hit me after I mailed you this morning. None of this is really unusual - but the sheer _volume_ of the interference we're getting is. It's a stress test now, and not just because Talbot got a bug up his ass. It's definitely the latter thing you said. At this rate, the summit's just not gonna happen."

"Talbot's attitude does not help us avoid that outcome, no."

Coulson put up a hand before Loki could elucidate his latest reason to hate authority any further. "Don't worry about Talbot. We're going to move stuff around to match the problem, because we _have_ to. Maybe we can find a way to start tamping it down, get the spigot under control. Loki, can we keep you on deck for a couple more hours?"

"I left Thor with some research. I doubt he'll find trouble." Loki frowned. There _had_ been a thing that morning before he hurried off. Some matter with a blue stone Thor had taken from a local watchman, with some vague warning about exactly what Loki had told Thor would be a problem with the local politics. The stone seemed fine, and despite certain very real issues mortals could have with fae, Loki hadn't noticed anything cursed or untoward misting around Thor. Much less lingering around the breakfast buffet. Only the smell of a good mead.

Loki hadn't studied that stone long as he'd needed to run back to Earth, but it was a basic watchman's enchantment. Inert. Harmless. Seen dozens like it. He hadn't given it a lot of thought since. And yet, it still nagged at the back of his mind. Like a splinter. He put it aside. "He's an adult, I think he'll be fine a few more hours. But I would like to return before nightfall there, if possible." The guilt was still a vague, thrumming, but ever-present thing.

"Think we can do that." Coulson stood up. "Come on, we're gonna go trade with the higher up for resources first. You're the muscle. Stand around and look scary, you're good at it."

Loki wasn't fooled by the tone. "But don't talk."

"Yeah, honestly, I'm looking for help, not open war."

. . .

There was something mostly like a staircase spilling out from the mouth of the old, overgrown library buried in the depths of the town. Moss covered smooth stones, and here and there were a few old wooden footsteps grown into the earth, but mostly it was a calm, peaceful space. Nothing like the city, which Thor had decided yes, overall, he was pretty much in total agreement with Loki on Alfheim in general. But this was a nice place. It had turned out to be pretty useless to him, the little old library, but it was gentle and pleasant and after the last few years he'd had, he could do with a bit of gentle pleasantry.

Thor shifted his bum on the soft loam, not out of discomfort but the tickle of some mental agitation. His hands dangled loosely between his knees, and he'd left the underground depths of the archive with nothing to show for hours of work.

It pestered at him, the idea that maybe he could have looked harder. That he missed something, some detail in that thick sea of old and musty paper that Loki surely would have caught first pass. That maybe he should go for a drink and a bite of something - it's all Alfheim seemed to offer, a bite of something, not a proper meal anywhere, breakfast had been a disaster - and dive back in.

But Thor didn't move.

He couldn't pinpoint his own thoughts, or maybe didn't quite want to. Loki was in them for certain, and he hadn't wanted to look too close at that. Some restlessness, something he didn't want to confront. It was going to come up anyway. His mind wandered back to explosions - asking for help there at SHIELD, the approach in the prison cells after their mother's death, the way Loki had blown up when Thor returned to Asgard, lies revealed. _Is it madness?_ Well, yes, it had been, then. Somewhat understandably, even. Not what Loki had done, of course, but the motivations. The realizations. The secrets.

And Thor hadn't spent much time thinking about it.

He'd grieved, of course. Loki was his brother. That had meant more than the nine realms to him for most of their lives. He _had_ cared. And he'd grieved deeply when Loki fell. Still grieved, when Loki had been found again - and found even more broken and dangerous. That his brother was now _alive_ , in a new way that mattered, that was a precious thing.

But Thor hadn't thought deeply on why it had all happened. What had gone wrong with Loki, what place he himself might have held in it. Why not? And why think about it now? Well, Thor thought he knew the answer to that now. Because the answers had wounded Loki once, and now all that hurt had come back around onto him.

Thor was not an idiot, and he didn't lack empathy. He could be angry and brash and forward, and he liked being all of that better, because caginess wasn't his thing. There was an honesty to how he chose to be, and for the most part he thought that raw honesty was the honorable choice. And now that honesty crawled up and kicked him solid in the arse, because it struck him from within that morass of thoughts that he hadn't wanted to deal with that it was, really, not all that great to finally, truly see all those old matters from his brother's point of view. Not because Thor had needed to _then_ , but because it was personal _now_.

Thor winced, and recognized why he didn't want to deal with these realizations.

Putting it baldly, his thoughts sucked.

"I'm sorry, brother," Thor said to thin air, because Loki didn't particularly care for apologies. Loki knew perfectly well how empty words could be, and how sharp that emptiness was. What Loki always liked better was people actually _doing_ something with useful knowledge, and Thor hadn't sussed how to do that out yet.

It was tricky shit.

He flexed his hands and looked down the arbor lane, seeing Elves flit into the treetops as if vanishing, and he recognized none of them, all slim and ephemeral in the late afternoon glow, and he knew he was deep in a place where he didn't belong.

. . .

Loki hurried into the same inn he'd left that morning, looking around for Thor and not immediately seeing him at the tavern-style row of stools at the far end of the common room. He ignored the startled looks he got. It was possible Thor was up in his own rented room, but that wasn't his style. It also wasn't his style to still be in a small-town library for hours on end, much less alone, which meant that Loki was already at a loss as to where he could be.

He whipped back out of the inn and down the visitor's ladder to the loamy earth beneath the trees, looked around, listened for yells, heard nothing, and said, quietly, "Uh oh."

It was never a good thing to misplace a Thor. Things broke, or people's skulls broke, or sometimes it was just a good old fashioned good natured bar brawl happening somewhere, but a bored Thor was usually a good way to get kicked out of, well, a planet.

It's not as if the man needed tending, exactly. It's just that Alfheim could bore the ass off a tree sloth if they weren't on some sort of dedicated action plan, and Loki had left him alone in an extra-boring section of the realm for about two hours longer than he'd wanted.

 _Fucking_ Talbot. The man made up for the ugly shortness of his hair with the length of his needless rambling. Oh, Loki did his part and bit his tongue and looked stress-inducingly frightening through Coulson's video call. Near half-off, he'd bitten it. He could still taste copper at the back of his teeth, though the bit he'd chewed open had already healed by the time the call ended. And Coulson got what he needed, after a lot of patient explanation and trying to not grin every time Talbot snuck a glance at Loki shadowing the back of the vidcall frame.

But by _gods_ , it had taken far too long.

He turned on the thoroughfare, soft dirt kicked up by his boots, and he wondered if there was an Elvish lost and found somewhere around the tourism hut.

"Loki." Behind him.

Loki whirled again, saw Thor, felt relief, showed none of it - _can't break character_ , muttered that old, wry bit of himself that still didn't like to give up what he felt for any reason but the most necessary, and tried to identify the building Thor had left. He couldn't, it was just a generic little hut. "What happened?"

Thor shook his head. "Stepped into a woodkeeper's shed to contact Leamhan."

It took a moment before Loki placed the name. From the morning's conversation. "The Elf. The watchman warning of some drama."

"May have found it." Thor's look turned worried. "I was sitting outside the library, having not found much. Was approached by a fae, a young looking fellow. Mooar was his name, a glashtyn, he said? I don't know what that means." Thor shrugged. "Deeply pleasant man. Asked me about the library, offered help since apparently he knows the place well. A clerk, he said he was. I turned him down, though he gave me a little useful information."

"All right?"

"Struck me odd, is all. After talking to the other man yesterday, something about this one struck me." Thor still looked concerned, one hand fussing with a gauntlet. "Leamhan already knew about him, as it happens. Said he was under watch. Troubling, really. I hope we haven't started something, coming here. Would be on me if that were so."

 _I really don't have time for nonsense Elvish politics_ , thought Loki, and he immediately dumped it in favor of finding a more helpful way to say it. "Then I'm glad you said something to the man. It's his job, as you say. I'm not sure it's wise to get further involved, though." Loki looked down, realized he was still in human clothes. No wonder he'd gotten such a reaction in the inn. He fixed that, then pushed a hand through his hair. "Apologies, I didn't think it would take that long to return. I certainly didn't want to leave you in any trouble - or where trouble could find you."

Thor shrugged, affably enough. "You were needed," he said, and it was so calmly accepting that it nailed that low, thrumming sense of guilt deeper into Loki like a dagger. In defiance, a piece of him wondered if Thor had been enchanted or turned, despite his own limping watchfulness.

He focused himself, put the old parts away, looked for a way to be helpful instead. "I've time now for awhile. We can go back into the library, tomorrow even, see if-"

"No need." The interruption wasn't at all short. It came with a shrug. "There's nothing there."

"Well, maybe you missed something."

"Loki, there's nothing to miss. There were a handful of old buyer's scrips that funded some grand festival several months before I was born, and of the festival itself, nothing. According to Mooar, they would have been destroyed, redacted, or kept somewhere else if someone thought they were important and I don't think anyone would have thought so. This isn't like the city." Thor laughed. "They're more pragmatic here. They assume that after a point no one will come weeding through the junk we dumped on them to keep, so they begin to actually junk it. We're the first to ask in centuries. There's nothing here worth the time. Our nonsense has fed a tree now." Thor waved a hand at the forest behind him. "Good job, really."

The only hint Loki gave to what he felt was that he rocked slightly back on his heels. Gods, he didn't want to go in this direction, and it was hard to not sound aggressive. "Is there reason to assume this Mooar spoke true if he's being watched?"

"Didn't seem like a useful thing to lie about. Save me from some paperwork, what of it?" Thor looked at him, then shrugged again. "Don't worry about it, brother. Come, we'll sup, we'll rest, we'll figure out what to do next in the morning."

"You've more threads?"

"I'm running thin already, Loki, but I'm sure we can come up with something. I've faith in your mind, and in my stubbornness."

 _How can my mind help you when I'm barely here?_

But again, Loki didn't say that aloud. Just that worry, screaming through the air like a viola, that he'd missed something important while he hadn't been looking. That he'd been too distant, or made too easy a mistake.

Like Odin might.

That fear, too, was buried down deep.


	9. Chapter 9

9.

. . .

Mooar. Ridiculous name, but that was a fae for you. Loki thudded the back of his head against the innroom wall, which did nothing satisfying as the 'wall' was actually a thick barrier of soft and mossy sod, speckled with tiny flowers that liked to gleam. It lit the room and mirrored the last few stars that peeked through the canopy of trees, an obnoxiously lovely effect. Dawn was quickly coming, and at least he'd stolen a nap. Fitful and dreamless. Too much on the mind, so he'd woken back up to study it all in the pre-dawn peace and quiet.

Loki put the timeline together in his head, spreading it out to make mental notes. There wasn't much to work on, but he put himself to it with his full focus anyway. Best to do so while he could. Before the dawn came full, and his phone woke up, and his mind divided itself all over again.

That Mooar had come out of the library by himself, approached Thor, and offered his help with the study of their family documents. He'd given information about how to wend through the remaining piles again, which Thor decided not to do. Good information, suggestions Loki would have added if he'd been there. And yes, Mooar had recognized Asgardian nobility quicker than Leamhan had. They had spoken, Mooar had taken his hand in friendship, and then he'd gone away again.

A simple enough scenario, no real meat on it. Nothing overly strange about it, by Thor's telling. But because Thor had been warned about possible issues - twice over - and because it had been long years of one betrayal or another in the Odinson family, the encounter had keyed up Thor enough that he'd gone to tell this other Elf, Leamhan, about it.

Only to find his suspicions instantly rewarded.

Loki wished, not for the first time, that he'd simply been there. Then he thought over the tale he'd pulled out of Thor over dinner once more, back and forth, looking for verbal nuance in Thor's tone, finding nothing. He went back, thought over the encounter with Leamhan, and the quick study he'd made of the watchman's stone. Again, nothing. All he had was Thor's words.

And something about it all nagged at him.

 _It's probably nothing more than exactly what I've already pointed out. Wallowed in, yet unable to change. The irritation that I was not here. I should have been, I offered to be, and I haven't been. Because some ruddy human arsebiscuit from who knows where has everyone going mad back at the office, and I'm damned good, but there isn't more than one of me available._

 _Which, let's admit it, thank gods for that. This poor universe. I'm singularly bad enough._

Loki tapped the phone against his crooked knee, thankful that there was at least a lull in the messages. Everyone had to sleep sometime, apparently even the bastard or bastards trying to wind up both his team and the entire UN.

 _So, back to more important issues. Thor's looking for documentation about the year of his birth. All our leads here end in nothing, and calling for a heist on Odin's own cache is less than wise. Could it be done? Maybe. Do I know anyone that could pull it off and not get executed for trying it?_

He did, actually, if it came down to it. He knew one person in the Nine Realms that had successfully forced entry on Odin's personal quarters, and had gotten away with it right in front of Loki's own face.

That was absolutely not a cry for help he wanted to send, though. It would lead to a whole box of his past that he didn't want to open. Bad enough that-

Loki cut off the thought with abrupt finality, not interested in thinking about the Framework again, if ever. He shifted on the cot and stared up at a soft, blue nebula that seemed to curl around the sky like a cat's tail. It faded even as he watched, that first hint of dawn chasing it away with lazy intent. A ruckus came from downstairs, intent and thudding along the few panels that made up the high canopy floors, and he didn't focus on it at first because he assumed, with memories made in Asgard, that it was the innkeepers preparing the morning meals.

Then he remembered the roasts were kept among the barer treetops, where the smoke became savory hints blended and matched with the rich herby smells of the forest, and also that Elves were usually not what anyone would call heavy movers.

The ruckus became louder yet. Mixed into it were angry shouts that were becoming very identifiable, and _that_ hit his alarms. Startled voices, bellowing and churning through the air. The sound of metal clanging. Loki began to sit up, wondering if he should at least stick his head out the door to investigate, when he heard the worst sound of all.

Thor's roar of fury and insult, filling the halls of the inn like thunder. "Get your hands off me, _damn_ you!" And more clanging - the sounds of a fight, rousing and violent, in old and sacred Alfheim.

Loki shot off the bed like an arrow, his hand on the door's grip. He flung it open, and found a knot of Elvish armored guards staring at him with almost as much surprise and confusion as he felt. One of them, the robed sorcerer of the group, had a hand out towards his door, and dangling in his other was a peacekeeper's key and chain. He could smell the magic on it. A shackle for other sorcerers, a common device in Alfheim. He'd worn chains marked with some of those enchantments before, and the recognition made his face go dead white.

"Now I know damned well you're not about to arrest me without full disclosure on what this nonsense is all about." It came out in a low, gritty seethe, masking his confusion and helping him forge it into almost murderous anger.

The sorcerer's voice was strained and polite to the point of agony. "Your Highness, if you will deign to accompany us to the palace freely, we would of course prefer to work with you without fetter. As your title demands. I apologize for the sight of these tools, it is my fervent hope they are no more than symbolic of my duty - and some other man's worse situation."

"What about my brother?" Not a trace less hostility. Not a whisper of that. Loki was something beyond livid, instantly, on behalf of both princes. Whatever this was about, someone was going to have to pay. He could still hear the fighting below. "What's his situation?"

"He will not agree freely, Your Highness." The sorcerer's tension began to crackle through his aura. He was frightened of Loki, badly, and that gave him a single thread of black pleasure. "Please, Prince. On behalf of the Queen, who speaks only well of your great realm."

Loki let a trace of tension out of his posture, just enough to let the sorcerer see he wasn't about to paint the walls with them all. Freely, then. Because, whispered that newer, more reasonable part of him, that's what his friends would do. If for no other purpose but to force answers out of this mess more efficiently than cutting these guards apart would.

And also because, by the sound of the ruckus below, force wasn't helping Thor.

Gods _damned_ Alfheim.

. . .

"I still don't understand." Loki wasn't pacing this time. He stood in front of the magic barrier that kept him from Thor's side of the holding area, like a drained white statue of pure, prickling anger, and he knew full well that could be more frightening to these small Elves and fae than anything else he could have done. Hell, it had worked nicely on Talbot mere hours ago - hours that felt suddenly like a week or more. "You're claiming Thor is, and I would laugh 'til I were sick if I wasn't so ruddy pissed off, in league with some Elf faction looking to undermine the Queen."

The Queen's factor was present. To Queen Aelsa's credit, this figurehead wasn't some thin fop better suited to cocktails and fairy dust. The factor _was_ a very small fae, though, and if Daisy were here she would have instantly made some crack about those plump old women fairies in that soppy children's tale about the sleeping girl. It probably would have gotten them all killed, by the look on this fae's face.

Yes, he'd seen the film. The resemblance between those fairies and this headstrong little person colored from top to bottom like a ruby gem was unavoidable. The guards shrunk as best they could from the two members of the Asgardian royal house, staying as far back as security would allow. This person - her name was apparently Adenium - stuck her tiny balled hands on her daintily armored hips and stared mercilessly back up at him from two feet away. Her small, translucent wings stopped fluttering, spread their full fifteen inches wide in a position of dominance. Her fearlessness made him angrier. In contrast, her voice was cool and stolid. "I'm afraid we have good reason to investigate this properly, sir."

"I would _love_ to hear all about your _investigation_."

"Kindly cut the acid from your tone, good prince. I'm not impressed." She looked past him. "Your Highness, mighty Thor, would you be good enough to cut us a few steps and explain for your kinsman what we know?"

"Mistress, I haven't a damned clue what you're on about." Thor remained seated within the magicked holding area. His arms were crossed against a chest recently stripped of the armor plate he almost always wore under his tunic, and there were two guards in there with him. Neither looked tickled with their part of the job.

"Oh. You're going with the same tone as your brother. That's worrisome, your highness. Very worrisome."

Damn the woman's warning. Loki snapped. " _What the hell is going on?_ "

Adenium sniffed. "We have been given due warning that Prince Thor, thus Asgard by proxy, came to Alfheim under false intent, with the purpose of allying himself with a faction we know to be operating with hostile goals towards Queen Aelsa and her family. Potentially with a mind to destabilize us among the realms."

Loki stared at her. This was already insane. "We came to look at soddy, soggy paperwork."

"How likely, good prince. Asgard's dumped its documents on us for centuries to remind us of our vows, and not once has it bothered to come collect it. Now you're here looking for receipts on the silverware used at some soiree or another?"

"That is, as dull and dumb as it sounds, _precisely_ what we had been doing, at both Verdurois and here." Loki bent, casting his shadow over the fae. "You can examine our activity at the city library. We sought the family genealogies there. Ask the High Archivist."

"The archivists will _never_ disclose a visitor's activity, Your Highness, as you well know. I am aware you're thoroughly studied of us. And surely, if it were important, Asgard has its own copies of such works. Your explanation makes little sense and it is not useful as an alibi. I'm very sorry." In his shadow, she continued to hold her dominance.

Loki did his best to not hang his jaw in outrage and shock, ending up with a set and bared line of teeth that didn't make him look like the sane and reasonable political agent he'd been successfully living as for several years. He'd made an easy mistake - _him_. Of course the archivists wouldn't speak to offer alibi. It went against all their nonsense protocols. A guard behind Adenium recoiled at his expression. He straightened up, collecting himself. "Then where is your evidence?"

Adenium arched a bright red eyebrow. "I hope you don't think we are so foolish as to bring in nobility without proof readily in hand."

"Oh, I hope that with religious dedication, Mistress Adenium. For all your sakes, I hope with you. I want to _see_ this proof."

"Speak to your kinsman, then. See if he talks this time."

Loki stared at her, then finally laughed outright. It rang through the holding area, high and amused and brittle as glass. "You're all mad. He's done nothing wrong. He holds no proof."

"Mm." Adenium looked past him, at one of the guards at Thor's side. "The small blue pouch. On the belt, under his left arm."

Loki barked another laugh, turned to watch the guard try to shove his hand under Thor's arm. Thor didn't fight him off, but he didn't help, either. The arm hung, thick and heavy, and the guard had to struggle. Thor and Loki locked eyes with each other as the guard pulled the small pouch free - a pouch intended for traveler's coin and small gifts, as any Asgardian might have on them - and Loki read the look clearly. _I have no damned clue, brother_.

Loki believed that look, or wanted to. Thor didn't lie as he did. He could trick and pretend, and had more than once to try and duck a parental dressing down, but not like Loki, and his face was an honest one. Loki had not been there, and his knowledge of these Elves Thor had met were all secondhand, but Thor had never been the man to lie about what he'd done.

Yet the guard pulled the pouch free, and what it held should have been unremarkable, save for a few coins. But there was a gem there, too. A small one, a sharply white opalescent cabochon, and its curve was engraved with a mark.

Thor started from his chair. Loki saw his face and knew it. Thor had never seen it before. It wasn't going to matter to the Elves. A reaction wasn't proof enough to doubt. "What _is_ that?"

"A token, sir, as you well know," said Adenium. "A marque of King Oberon."

"Fuck," said Loki, blunt and bitter, knowing a snapped trap when he saw one, and the guards recoiled from him again.


	10. Chapter 10

10.

. . .

They took Thor away after the reveal of the treasonous stone. Loki didn't know for certain where, but he was probably in the royal cells below. Loki was permitted to remain in the open holding area meanwhile, as a 'courtesy.' Loki did his absolute best to not scream where the Elves could shove their courtesy, how, with how much force, and what they could do with themselves afterward, but his face got a fair amount of it across.

Delicately, Adenium had pretended to not notice his stress.

Meanwhile, he paced once again. He had windows to the good clean air of Alfheim, and there was only one guard, and someone had decided he was no risk of flight, and his own confusion about all of this made him even angrier. It was not the usual thing for _him_ to be treated more genially in a prison, and the fact that the Elves were currently seeming to confer on what even to do with him damn near blew his mind.

In short, his reputation in Alfheim was better than Thor's. By a lot.

Loki took all emotions he didn't like to deal with as an excuse to be upset. He was upset frequently. It drained his energy, that much anger and confusion. Part of him suspected that's what the Elves hoped for, to keep him passive and non-homicidal.

The idea that Thor had, behind his back, connived with some Elf or fae idiot to undermine the royal house wasn't even laughable anymore. It was insane. It was simply not a question to him, 'evidence' be damned. All the fair questions a man or woman could have about Loki's reputation and reliability _never_ extended to Thor. Not even in Loki's darkest thoughts.

The evidence had been planted somehow. By that Mooar, possibly, an Oberon lackey intending to blackmail a prince into having no choice but to help him. It was the sort of thing the Oberonese had done before.

The scenario popped into Loki's head with that kind of tactical clarity he specialized in.

 _Oh, good prince! Has no one helped you? The libraries can be difficult for visitors._ Thor had remembered the man's words well enough, told Loki when he'd gotten time enough to ask. The guild pinged, sharpened, dug deeper. He should have been there.

The vague, watery image of Mooar - Loki had no firm idea what he looked like, only that scrap of description from his brother - patted with real warmth at Thor's arm, right where the little blue pouch hung. A quick finger, maybe even a trace of magic, and Mooar went on his way with grace. To collaborators, likely. To tell them that Oberon's schemes will have a prince to move across the board, whether he wills or no.

Loki shook his head, pushing away the vision. He didn't have proof that was how it went down. But it was a decent theory. To investigate it, he would have to get out of this room. He would need time.

From his things, in the guard room next door, he heard the soft sound of his phone, no doubt causing the keepers to puzzle at it, and his guilt and his guts began to churn all over again, feeding on the anger and building something else in its place.

. . .

Finally it was that Adenium again, at the open door. "I'm sorry for the wait, Your Highness. It needed to be that we had to confer. And to that end, and to our sorrow, for we wanted to keep this matter quick and neat, I must, on behalf of our Queen, ask for you to come with me to her throne. Will you, Prince?"

Loki opened his mouth, strained and exhausted and still ready to struggle, and then willfully took calmer control over himself. There was little point in fighting Adenium outright. She'd proven herself strong, and the Queen was a decent sort. He might have better luck with her. Better a different tack. "Of course I will. May I request a singular courtesy?"

"Which is?" She seemed chagrined for some reason, possibly willing.

"I have a device with my confiscated things. A Midgardian device, a communicator. I'm sure by now the throne is aware that I have been there of late more than I've been in Asgard. All I want is a moment to look at it. Send a message back, if possible. A mundane one. They are not in a position to interfere with this situation." Unfortunately true. If he thought for a second he could yell for help and have a pack of SHIELD agents turn up and break Thor out of prison, he'd give it a shot. Regrettably, he knew full well he'd end up with dead humans and more guilt. Elvish spears were as deadly as Asgardian ones.

The buzzing from the other room had been persistent. His nerves, already not in the best of shape, were now totally shot.

She studied him, not suspiciously. Possibly the guards had complained to her about the sound. "You must be supervised, and I'm sure I have no need to express any of our fears, should your behavior be anything but what you say."

"Of course not." She stepped aside to let him pass, and he felt her eyes on him as he swept his way to the guard's desk.

The phone had an obscene number of messages on it. Loki ignored most of them, filtered it for the right keywords. The emergency words.

They highlighted quickly for him, to his dismay. Something newly important on Midgard, something Latverian, or at least a situation masquerading almost perfectly as such. The first whisper of an actual attack in the making, an assault on the UN conference now becoming - or at least seeming - a very immediate reality. Yet more stress, either way. They needed him ASAP to confer on the situation. He had taken that first look at the Wakandan intel, which now had fresh relevance. And of all of SHIELD, he was one of two living agents who had walked within Latveria.

 _Gods_.

His fingers curled around the phone. Loki could run, dart out of the palace so fast the guards wouldn't be able to stop him, and slipstream his way through one of the hidden doors between realms. But if he did that, Thor would be the one to pay for his escape, and he would damage relations between Asgard and Alfheim, even possibly sour any potential future relationship Alfheim would have with Midgard itself.

All for human security. Because his friends needed him, and that mattered. But the cost…

Loki's hand shook with barely contained stress as he clenched the phone, then he put it back down on the desk, in front of the guard. "Thank you," he said to Adenium, over his shoulder. Nothing of what he felt, what he'd almost done, was in his voice. He didn't know what to do. "I'm ready to see the queen."

. . .

Queen Aelsa Featherwine treated her throne like an accessory, a thing to ignore in the background while she moved, quick and light around her audience chamber. Loki had been in her presence once before, when he was young. As a courtesy before his time in one of the sorcerous academies out in the trees. He remembered that hour well, and he thought he liked her. Aelsa seemed from his knowledge to be intelligent, often kind, and also curiously stubborn when she decided to be. She looked unchanged from those long ago years. Small, lithe, with pure white hair braided up on her pure white brow. It showed off the length of her pointed Elven ears - and the two tiny elklike ivory horns on her brow that marked her kinship with those Fae that had lived in Alfheim in the ages before their own sect of explorers crossed on to Midgard.

She was a paradox in her own realm. The structure of severe bureaucracy that kept the Light Elves safe in city society seemed equally like an armored shell designed to keep her and her free personality in - and she permitted it. She exercised her most powerful rights of rulership at rare intervals, allowing her councils to pass most orders without her input.

Loki had never understood why, although since his own downfalls perhaps now he could cobble together a theory. Nor did he fully understand why she had called him to the floor before her, indicating a willingness to act directly today - she had allowed other, worse scenarios to play out without a word.

He looked at the rest of the attendees, noticing the usual thin faces of long-term councilors and merchants and bards. There was also a group of ambassadors milling along the other side of the room, and among them were a tall, thickly built Dwarf, a handful of Xandarians, and, meeting his own eyes with silent curiosity, a surprisingly short jotun woman. She still towered over many of the others, even himself, but not by much. One of Farbauti's loyalists, he assumed, his mind still too drained and distant to really study any of them.

She inclined her head to him, slight but firm, and he returned the gesture with eyes lidded in respect. That seemed to please her, and she looked away with delicate propriety.

Aelsa paused along the far wall of her chamber, a wall of translucent marble that showed the shadows of the ivy that grew on the outside, and she looked at him from its lee. The shadows sharpened her face, gave her a dual mask. Then she stepped back into the light and gave him that brilliant, beaming smile he saw once before. "Prince Loki!" Then it vanished again as she clasped her hands together, like a magic trick. "It's a conundrum, really. I'm so glad to see you again in Alfheim, and yet, also sorrowful it has to be under these circumstances."

Loki dipped his head low, saying nothing yet. She had a tendency to speak quickly and at length, her voice like chimes over soft water. It was better to wait for her to set an opening.

Her expression brightened again. "But let's speak of lighter things first, to ease the room." She flitted swiftly towards the other end of the chamber. A handmaiden tried to intercept her, do the work of pouring a small, fine little cup of honeywine, and Aelsa gently slapped the hand away. "Nobles to nobles, dearest, let me at my work."

The handmaiden swallowed and pulled away again. A council plant, no doubt. Another rein and check on a Queen that played an entirely different game than the ones they cared about. A second cup, and Aelsa was on her way back to Loki. She gave it to him with a graceful flourish. "All the secrets of the nine realms, our pasts, our chains, and the rest aside. To this cup I offer what matters, us alive tomorrow, we over the future bestride." She lifted her cup to him.

Loki drank, still silent, wondering what riddles were buried in that toast. He had never been able to read the Queen, not even in her written missives that usually formed communication between Asgard and the Elvish realm, and that had always made him admire her more than a little. He wished he could enjoy this, but he was torn in too many directions. None of him was really here.

Aelsa drank hers and took the little cup back, turning towards the counter. "Tell me you still practice your magic in the way of old, from when you were so little enough for even me to yet tower over you. Oh!" She snapped back around, not even bothering to notice the surprise that crept onto his face. "But you don't know. That time you came to our court was not the time we first met. I didn't tell you that then, did I?"

Aelsa didn't wait for a response. "Frigga introduced us. You were still small and pudgy and you cooed, mostly, and I think you spit up once but no matter, and she said you were going to be an excellent sorcerer. I could tell, she was right, you had the scent on you. Fresh and crisp, like a good snowstorm where the world is all quiet and white after. And other things, too, like that, but I could tell it wasn't seemly to bring it up. A secret is a secret. Oh, but I miss my sister queen." She looked up at him, seeming to forcefully pause herself. "You _do_ still practice?"

"Your Majesty, magic is one of the few true callings of my life, a thing I would even dare admit to love. It is the skill I continue to devote to as rightfully as I may, and as my mother predicted." The most honest thing he could say, a gift to offer the ancient queen. It struck him, suddenly, that his own words had an echo to them that he hadn't realized. He couldn't concentrate on that right now, there was no time, no place to center himself. But he sensed movement from the cluster of ambassadors.

"That is good, Prince Loki. That is _very_ good." She left the cups on a different, smaller table, distracted from her original course. "Your brother. We've an issue."

"I'm afraid we do, Majesty."

"Adenium has told me. I like her, she's small and clever and wise and she doesn't care for nonsense. She doesn't like me at all, but she respects me, and tells she doesn't like my choices, and why she doesn't, all with honest words when I ask her for advice, and for that I know I can trust her." The small hands clapped together. "That's useful, young prince. So very useful to me. And she's told me the problem, and she didn't want to - well, that's not quite true, I expect you'd gather, it's the council, they didn't want to bother me with it, and they put my Adenium in the middle of it, and she's a bit grump about it." Aelsa laughed, ringing and happy, glinting enough with magic to light the enchanted candles a little brighter. "But it's the Odinsons, and I haven't seen _you_ in forever, and some things are so important yet they get left aside. Small things are important, good prince, and so I like to pay attention to those when I can. So I gave an order - I did give an order, didn't I?"

"Your Majesty," said another of the handmaidens when the Queen swiveled around to look for an answer. "You did."

"Oh good. Then he's on his way up." Aelsa seemed to glide around the room again, as light as her fae heritage, becoming almost translucent in the filtering light. "Leamhan, that is. This was his operation. Leamhan, my little moth man, always on the lookout for threats to us from without and within. He's another smart one, tall and clever, and he likes a good jape. A fine man to drink with." Aelsa beamed at Loki. "But enough, you know about Leamhan. Or your brother does, doesn't matter. Suffice to say, I am aware of the problem. I am asking Leamhan to join us, as I would like him to answer a question for me that I think is terribly important."

Aelsa snapped her fingers as a rattle came at the chamber door, a tinkling little noise. "And that's him!"

Loki turned to watch the new arrival, overwhelmed by that barrage of words, realizing instinctively there had been something important, obviously and terribly important hidden in there. Leamhan was spindly and grey and light, a moth indeed with a dour expression. The moth man spoke, as fair and breathy as his looks. "Your Majesty. I came as quick as the word."

"On wings as light as aether, good Leamhan. As you do." Aelsa pointed at him. "I have two princes here in my home and I am told we cannot trust them. Leamhan, tell me, is this the truth? The whole of it, or part of it? You will tell me, yes?"

"Your Majesty… We are still attempting to sort out the events properly. I can avow that our concerns about Prince Thor remain firm."

Suddenly, oddly quiet, Aelsa regarded the tall Elf. Only the trace of energy around her, that eternal signature of magic seemed to waver. Loki watched her, saw one eyebrow raise in a demand. He himself wanted to yell at the Elf, demand answers as to why he'd approached Thor so cheerfully, if this was to be Leamhan's new turn.

Leamhan seemed to creak from within under the Queen's pressure, his gaze darting to Loki. "But we do not have the grounds to say both princes are tangled alike in this matter."

"Well, there you go. I should like to release this one meanwhile." Loki tried to not jerk at the abruptness of her statement. She'd said it as casually as asking for a light supper. "Can you speak advice to me on that?"

"I… Majesty, I can only advocate for the good Prince Loki to be permitted to roam the palace and no more, until my investigation is done."

"And how long will that take?" The words shotgunned out of Loki, the ghost of a phone's ring in his ear. He'd strained forward towards the queen, not realizing it. The handmaidens stared at him, stunned at the breach. "I apologize for the disruption, but I must. I am needed elsewhere as much as I am needed here. An emergency. Please."

Aelsa looked at him, and there was something sharp in her eyes. Kind, but sharp. "Adenium told me. The little device, it jingles so much. Cute people, those humans. They look like we do, small and plump and silly - oh no, wait, those are the babies. Just like ours. They _do_ grow up, but so quickly and for so brief a time, and some of them stay plump. But they're all funny and cute still. Puppies, but thinking and bright. You like them?"

Honesty again, by way of desperation. "I've come to, Majesty. And these few like me. They sent me a message, saying they are in trouble. I need to help them, and then return to my brother's side to see his trouble set right. For I am _certain_ this is all some terrible mistake. You've my promise, that's all I need."

She studied him, again with that same, sudden stillness, and Loki thought about masks, and why he'd instantly liked her, hundreds of years ago, a younger prince still figuring his ways around a good shield spell and how to not trip over his own feet at a political moot. "Oh, dear."

He realized amidst the hurtle of his thoughts that she hadn't said it aloud. Just that thrum of deep magic.

Alfheim had mysteries to it that it itself had never riddled out.

"I can't put my office's faith in that, Your Majesty." Leamhan looked apologetic. "It's not about trust, it's a safety protocol. For Alfheim. As long as we're untangling this mess - and to be sure, I would like nothing more than to find Prince Thor's innocence in the end, as well - I must have access to witnesses and evidence. Even a brief departure, with a promise to return, it might carry some legal risk. I can't vouch for it, my lady."

Loki strained against his inner self once again, within a hair of screaming that he could have simply fled when he had the chance, but hadn't, and then he cursed himself for not having done it.

"Mmmmmmmm." Aelsa folded her hands together, looking disappointed. She swept the room with a glance, seeming to think. She didn't react to the prince all but vibrating nearby. The magic around her seemed to ebb and flow. "How sorrowful. Is there nothing in our laws that allow us to bend to honor?"

"Majesty." One of the ambassadors spoke, a low and rich voice, and Loki, now with his back to them, realized it was the jotun. He knew that type of accent, a shaman's accent, from the sharp-winded mountains where the Queen had once come from. He knew that, but not much more. "Majesty, I will advocate for the prince. I, for Jotunheim, will mark his pledge to return, and to maintain contact with the realm if he must remain there for just cause."

Loki didn't look at the ambassador, though shock ricocheted through his body. A Frost Giant pledging their word for an Asgardian's honor, remarkable under any circumstance. For him - once it would be a raw miracle. But instead, by chance, he was looking at Leamhan, and he saw, for a microsecond, the expression change to frustration's sneer.

The pit in Loki's belly grew, dropped, and became something blacker than the night. Something was deeply and terribly not right here, something he hadn't predicted. Loki's face turned back to Aelsa, and he gave up nothing except his otherwise true look of tension.

"Oh, well, that's _perfect_." Aelsa seemed to notice none of this, and now Loki suspected she saw _all_ of it. She was clapping now, as if for a curtain call. "I have absolutely no doubts that today's Prince Loki will remain true to Jotunheim's honor. Imda, you do me a great kindness."

Somehow Imda, the jotun ambassador, did not laugh at this. Neither did Loki. The darkness in him continued to swirl, and he tamped it down to wait for a better time.

"Imda, my good prince, please, set quick your terms and vow with each other, and by my word I'll set you on your way to your friends. Oh, but do come back, do!"

Imda stepped forward from the other ambassadors before Loki could move, a broad blue hand raised in a gesture of peace. "Prince Loki, I need no term or vow. I, for my Queen, choose to trust in the honor of Asgard's house. Return as quick as you can, and with my word, I set you free." She bowed to him, a woman's curt but graceful dip, and Loki could have bubbled over with a thousand new questions, but there was no time or place for them. He had to hurry, _had_ to.

Leaving Thor alone in Alfheim would lead to new trouble for him, Loki had no doubt. Torn between two places that desperately needed him, Loki made his own bows, uncomfortable with his freedom coming from passivity and truth and little else, and then all but fled towards the passages that would take him to his confiscated gear and then, just as quickly, back to Earth.


	11. Chapter 11

11.

. . .

Thor watched Leamhan visibly wrestle with himself, the man's fine and noble face shadowed with perfect woe. The Elf was on the other side of the magical wall that kept Thor within his cell, and despite that wall, Thor managed to stay calm. There was no point to mindless berserker anger at the moment. He could, yes, call the thunder and cut himself right on out of Alfheim without a look back over his shoulder, but though he'd been deadly furious at the inn, he'd known enough not to do mortal harm there, either. Easy anger would lead to even easier complications.

Over the years, he'd learned that much from his brother's colder tactics. If not Odin's own mistakes. There was a lot of use in remembering to stop and think, even if just for a second before acting. He should have said so to Loki at some point. In any case, Thor wasn't surprised when Leamhan, sorrowful and handwringing, started at last to speak to him.

"My good prince, my friend. I'm so sorry to be the one to tell you. Your brother has left Alfheim."

Thor shifted on the soft brocade bench they'd given him. The lady Adenium was a sharp little woman, but she wasn't cruel. Even the food she'd ordered brought to him had made for a good sup. A far hardier meal than the inn, with good meat and a loaf of bread for his own. No mead, but that was just as well. Though, for a moment, he found he missed the pizza he'd had on Earth the other day. That stuck to the ribs in a way he liked very much.

There was a paradox in Adenium's treatment, somewhere. Thor left it alone for now, realizing his thoughts were wandering. Leamhan continued to study him, perhaps looking for some reaction to the bad news he'd granted.

"He was in a hurry, desperate to leave." The hands twisted, as if the spindly man were in personal pain. "I'm certain whatever it was, it was important enough to leave his good brother's side, and yet, I'm struck by his departure." The fine voice lilted and lowered, probing at Thor. Yes. He was definitely looking for something.

 _Ah_ , Thor thought, not entirely sure what he'd realized, but knowing there was something in Leamhan's study he should pay attention to. Meanwhile, he said nothing. Only watched. Another thing he learned from Loki.

Leamhan swallowed. "I advocated for his stay, of course. This… dreadful… matter being so complicated, it would have been a great help if he would have remained to help sort it during this most crucial time, but he left with the help of the Jotunheim ambassador." He shook his head, tastefully disapproving. "I must make no judgment of this. I'm quite sure it was a matter of some new diplomatic kindness. As I am equally sure the reason we hold you will be revealed to be some mistake. I cannot possibly believe that you are any enemy of this realm, not from that first night I met you at the village inn."

Thor leaned back on his bench, and the thought crystallized further into fact. He had made a sort of simple mistake at that first meeting, a trap anyone could have fallen into. This man was no friend, and he lied using truth.

He knew this, because there was absolutely no gleam of falsity in Leamhan's words, but Thor also knew his brother, and his brother's friends - and because of all of that, he also knew a bit about how men can lie in that easy, weaving way. "I'm sure of that as well," he said, cheerful and certainly unconcerned. Sounding as free as he could inside a cage. The happy lie could go both ways, and he'd learned that from his brother, too. "Ah well. Can't be helped. The matter will get sorted."

Leamhan almost but not quite flinched, a crinkle at the corner of his eye, something newly tense in the hands. Thor tried to not grin. "My prince-"

"Loki will return, my good friend Leamhan. I'm sure if we wait for him, all this will be sorted out as clean as any of us could want. No misunderstandings." Now Thor grinned as if he were still drinking in the inn. "This ambassador, they vouched for his safe departure, but I'm sure they also vowed for his return return." Standard diplomatic protocols. Maybe jotun 'hostage' style vouchsafing, almost every realm had something like it. A simple vow between parties, and Thor was functionally the hostage in this scenario. Good on the jotun, and to Hel with Leamhan for trying to use that as another wedge. "And I'm quite sure this was done with the permission of the queen." This he was fuzzier on, but Loki had said something vaguely favorable about the royal house. It was worth the gamble.

"Ah, of course." Leamhan smiled, that tension still behind his eyes. Thor read it. The gamble was a good one. "Nothing in our realm is done without the bright eye of our queen on it."

"Then there's indeed nothing at all to worry about." Thor clapped his hands together once, firm and strong, all but a royal dismissal of Leamhan for now. He had that much power as a prince, even behind the magick'd wall. Without another witness to the interview, without Loki in realm, Thor wasn't about to start answering questions on any of this. Not with Leamhan now sucking up to him, playing to sympathies. "Let's wait a while, have some more sup. All will turn out fine, Leamhan. Just fine."

Thor watched Leamhan back away from his cell with a promise to bring more food, polite and the barest bit stiff, knowing he'd taken a victory away from the Elf. For now, he would have to hope that his recently reforged faith in Loki was wise.

Thor leaned back on his bench, calm but not complacent. He believed it was.

. . .

Loki ran both hands through his hair, looking at the busy wall of information and its three additional live feeds of armed SHIELD teams in Europe, and shook his head. He tried to ignore the sensation of his brain physically wiggling as he did so, the ache and exhaustion setting in hard amidst the ringing jangle of his mixing thoughts. He looked back at Coulson and Mack. "It doesn't make sense. None of this does. Tell me again what you spotted."

Mack pulled up his notes. "The reason that group vidcall got canceled, the one you checked in with me on. We had a guy at the embassy do a follow-up on it."

"The one with no discernible reason for that cancellation."

"Right. It didn't come from the ambassador himself, it came from a guy in his retinue. _That_ guy, we ran a check, his background seems clean. And _that_ guy doesn't remember canceling the call. Which, so what, you think, fifteen parties didn't sit on a phone call about stuff we don't even actually care about yet. Big whoop. He could have been really tired and it was in between six other things he was doing for his boss and he forgot about it."

"But," said Loki.

"But, we saw something in the Wakandan intelligence. Something about an interference drone being deployed, using new tech. So Fitz did a call with the UN onsite teams and had them do a scan on three different frequencies our information indicated. Nothing, really. All pretty inert stuff."

Loki nodded, seeing where this was going. "Inert. But put it all together and they found something."

"Yup. Now we think someone might've wanted the outgoing lines at all related embassies clear that night so they could splice in that new kind of intercept on all audio coming from them."

Daisy interrupted. "Okay wait, shit, I read that and I didn't fully comprehend it. We found something that's gonna be able to compromise _all_ diplomatic phones? The encrypted ones?"

"It's a jacked up version of the eavesdropping tools we've been seeing pop up in DC lately. Only this thing's decrypting even current secure keys at a 1:1 ratio. It comes in noise, it goes out to the listener like stereo. That's new. That's not even current, that's next decade tech." Mack didn't say it. No one wanted to watch Loki pop off again.

Loki took it in the spirit that was intended. "Which matches what we got from Wakanda. Whether the actors are from Latveria or not, it's Latverian level technology. And it's going to be subtle. So with the intercept figured out, having spotted it, the team did a backtrace and while they were at it, found something else going on. Activity. The emergency."

"Yeah." Mack scrolled again. "Looked like a passive situation, but it's got a problem in it if you look close. Let me tie this back in first, though. The guy that doesn't remember cancelling the vidcall. _Maybe_ he got spoofed, maybe he glitched. His boss says he's got a clean background."

"But is it actually clean?" Loki stuck a hand out to Mack.

Mack handed him the tablet, making sure the relevant data was up. "Nope. He's got recent dead time, off grid. We got him flying DC to Istanbul, then he's gone. Pops up four days later, Istanbul back to Dubai International."

"That's not proof, though. Just a man traveling through an area where dead time can happen. The records through there are going to be spotty. I assume we're looking for eyewitnesses." Loki studied the tablet, unaware he wasn't actually reading it.

He missed what Mack said next.

 _Passivity_ , he thought, suddenly disjointed. _Passive situation_. _Inert_.

He jerked his head up, seeing that no one had noticed him fade out.

"So like I say," said Mack. "It's not that we got proof, it's like we got the absence of proof. We've got this dude with his missing time, and we've got this new tech, but it's only going one way and we don't know where it actually came from. And then it all feeds towards the real problem. The emergency. Coulson."

"It's going back to what we got out of Ambassador Engels this morning," said Coulson, apparently following up on something else Loki had missed in an earlier fugue state. "His warning is a big deal, that's why we were trying to get you on the line. I trust the German eyes on this as much as I do Wakanda."

Right. He remembered now. The warning. The bit that had apparently set off Loki's phone while he'd been in a holding area trying to figure out what the hell to do. German intel passed to them some chatter on a darknet line that matched previous warnings. A build up to an actual event. Loki nodded. "But nothing's been found at the site yet. Still no sign of a deployed device, nor any suspicious actors in the area. We're on emergency activation, but there's no sign of the fire. Even a Latverian device is going to show if we're looking for it, and we've gotten a good handle on their reactive camouflage programs in recent years. No more surprise death robots."

"Red team's about to start its third sweep."

Daisy spoke up with a grumble. "Which means we just cancelled like six hours of diplomatic grip and gripe that the Human Rights council really needed."

And had given Loki damn near a heart attack while in holding, but he chose to not to get into that with his friends.

"Better than getting killed." Mack leaned back against the wall, watching the livecam of the Red team on the move through a corridor so new they could probably still smell the paint. "The warning made it look like they were ready to go. If they got wind that we came in to stop it… I mean, yeah. Maybe we can't know if we already won. Maybe that danger passed. It's hard stuff."

"Still. All this noise and yet not much real to show for it. The proof is… it's vague, and we don't yet know who stands to benefit from it. And half of the main players, I don't even know what they look like." Loki handed the tablet back. The world looked grey again.

"Loki?" Coulson squinted at him. "You know Engels. You know the Turkish team better than we do."

"Hm?" Loki shook his head, realizing he'd done it again. Faded out. Crossed the mental streams. He was carrying too much. "Right. I do."

"Are you alright?"

"I'm fine." That was true, wasn't it? The absolute truth. _He_ was fine. Thor was in a cell, just like he had been for years. Maybe even sitting in there thinking his brother was having a cynical laugh about it. _The manacle's on the other foot at last, brother_. _Are you happy?_ "I'm here." It sounded normal in his mouth, those words. Hadn't they?

Coulson studied his face, saying nothing. Maybe they hadn't.

Loki almost reached for the tablet again, not sure why, then stopped himself. He turned away from his friends and looked at the livestream wall and all of its scrolling data, and read none of it. "So the scenario is that… is that there are parties somehow highly invested in listening in and then using taken information to plan their own moves, and while the chaos is useful, so far no one's gotten actually hurt. And they're using diplomatic… players… that may not even be aware they're involved." He stopped. "I'm sorry, I'm trying to detangle two situations at the same time. There's just enough overlap that. Well. I've got a lot on the mind."

He heard silence behind him. He still wasn't reading the screen. "You ever feel like you're missing something ridiculously important, but it's small, and you've probably looked right at it, and it's not going to unlock everything, but it's the right place to start?"

"Every goddamn day, Loki." He heard Coulson shift. "You see something?"

Passive. Inert. Small.

 _Adenium doesn't like me but she's so honest about it_ , said Queen Aelsa in his head, as if she were there with him in the command room. _I can trust her because I know where things stand. She doesn't pretend. Whoop, here comes Leamhan. Good for a drink and a jape, friendly fellow. Do watch his expression, good prince. Watch him._

The tiny, tiny sneer. The tightening hands. Leamhan's mask, slipping.

 _I know you saw, young prince,_ said the ghost queen.

 _Yes. I did. I doubted myself a little for a while, just as I doubted Thor, just a little, deep down, because I wasn't there and I don't have all the information. I wasn't there. But you told me not to trust Leamhan, by not saying anything at all. You wanted me to know that about him. Why? What else is here?_

The mask where Mooar's face should have been, because Loki didn't know what he looked like. But was he an actual threat, or was he just a diplomat's assistant with dead time in his ledger? The mask drifted away.

Another thought came filtering back. Passive. A watchman's 'chant stone. Like his own spell, on the border of Latveria. It did nothing, except when it did something. Like listen, maybe, and tell a watchman who wasn't really just a watchman?

Maybe only that? Maybe something more dangerous? The scenario ran through his head again. He shook his head, tried to look at the screen. It was white noise. He wasn't here, either.

"Loki?"

"I can't do this," Loki heard himself say at last, the words dragging out of him like rubble. He always told himself he could run from a fight, from his own defeat, forever if that's what it took. Until he couldn't. The words were a struggle. "I can't."

There was silence in the room.

Loki turned around, saw Coulson looking at him, and Mack, and Daisy. He didn't know how he sounded. "I can't do this. I can't do both. I can't… I can't help resolve this… this Latverian ghost, and help Thor. My brother is in a cell and I'm _here_ , and whatever monstrous tangled shit some bastard's whipped up to drive us all deranged has got me knotted up and I can't help resolve this from _there_ , and I can't save him if I'm doing this. I _can't_. I cannot do two things at once like this. I…"

Coulson leaned his butt against the command room desk, just watching him.

There was only one answer. Loki had made a promise. He'd wanted, at least a little, to try. "Coulson, I need to go. I told him I'd help, and right now he's in a godsdamned cell because I haven't been as much help as I needed to be, and some arsehole snuck in behind me and got him in a jam for reasons I don't understand. Because I wasn't there to see it happen."

Loki took a breath, not sure what he was feeling. Laser focus came back, just one jolt of it, necessary. All the gears of his mind crunching through what he could give. "We know it's not Latveria. I promise you that. Call… Call Miss Romanoff. Have her run down the black market sales of tech from Latveria's previous games. She'll have most of what I know, she can parse my report from Latveria better than anyone. We know from history that Roxxon and its subsidiaries had access to that tech through von Bardas. Call her, too, see if she's in one of her stable phases. See who was acting as buyer conduits, that'll get you the new intercept devices. The lost time, that I don't know. I can't shake that this is a wagging dog, that-"

"Agent Loki." Coulson put a hand up to stop him. He was calm, and his face said he understood. "Go. Get out of here. We've got this. I'll get Romanoff on the line. You just go help your brother. He needs you."

Loki opened his mouth, realized he didn't know what to say, and got.

. . .

Mack shrugged as Coulson shared a look with him and Daisy. "I got a little brother. It's just how it is sometimes. You have the Romanoff call, Coulson?"

"Sure do. Daisy, can you try the clinic, see how Lucia's feeling? Mack, keep an eye on the teams for me. I'm going to go catch up with Talbot first real quick, let him know I want a fourth squad onsite at the UN building, and I want a silent lockdown on all communications routed through there. He asks why, I'll tell him he can send a subpoena after he gives me the authorization because it's an emergency. I believe Loki. It's not Latveria, and maybe he's right on the rest. It's a ghost. It really is gonna come down to us chasing our tails like dogs." Coulson took the tablet from Mack, glancing at the livestreams before looking at Daisy. "We definitely have this."

"You think he's okay?" Daisy looked up into his face, worried. "Loki usually doesn't, like, show actual emotion like that. I don't think he knew he did. He was strung out. He was feeling really guilty about nearly cracking up there, and I shouldn't be able to tell you that."

"It's a big ol' messed up family, Daisy, and the hell of it is they do care about each other when it gets serious. That's the priority. When he comes down, he'll know we get that. No problem. Come on, let's go save the world again."


	12. Chapter 12

12.

. . .

"Ma'am." The small, green fae rapped at the door, sticking her head in. Ambassador Imda set down the secure nanographene tablet, still a bit too small for her giantess hand but she made do, and she looked over at the wee creature and her nervous wings. They made her nervous, these very tiny fae. She was going to step on one someday, and she had no idea what the paperwork between her two Queens - Farbauti and Aelsa - was going to look like when that happened. "Ma'am, diplomatic visitor."

"Send them in," said Imda. She smoothed the fold of her old tunic with two fingers, a meditative gesture she learned from her old teacher, a mute giant that even now served at their queen's side, and looked up as her guest entered. Then her eyebrows arched up, sharp and dark, all the way to the knots of her ink black hair. "In a rush to Midgard, in a rush right back. Might've at least had a meal there, Prince of Odin, though that you honor the promise we spoke before the Queen is a great relief to me."

"Food is, if not quite exactly the last thing on my mind, distanced enough to matter to someone other me's stomach in an entirely other dimension. Does that make sense?"

She leaned back on her bench and looked at the narrow young man with his tired eyes. She knew what he was, of course, and thought that odd little truth fit, considering what she saw at her Queen's side. She herself never made a decision on him one way or the other before, why bother? Never met the man till now. "A bit obscured, Prince Loki, but I think I've got the shape of your meaning. I was present at the first offer of charges against your brother, you should know. The Queen likes to have her audiences while the feymen speak their troubles to her. I know where this began. In the inn of Verdurois, where he met the Queen's watchman first over food and drink."

"You see, that's very interesting you say that to what I say, very interesting." Prince Loki's eyes gained a glint of wry wildness to them. "Others might have said this began with the meeting of this possible Oberonese agent, this Mooar."

She steepled her fingers together before her, deciding that she liked this quarter pint of a giant after all. If nothing else, it was clear he could see better than most, and that was valuable. "Well, I'm sure whatever _I_ say isn't any proof of some dark conspiracy. It's only a fact of the timeline."

"Oh yes. As it stands, that's all it is. Again, our mutual friend Leamhan might say a good watchman for the Queen attempted to intercept a potential problem a day before a planned contact, and to his great despair, he could not succeed. Word to word, and what proof there is yet in hand doesn't rip his tongue from his mouth."

Imda rested her wrists on the desk she'd brought from home, a thick stone slab resting on borrowed Elven lattice-steel. It was the incongruity she liked. Like this conversation, jagged and sharp and going in at least three different directions at once. Much like talking to Farbauti. "Proof is a dear currency, and oft hard to come by." She tilted her head. "Regrettably, as an ambassador and as a friend to two great Queens, I am not such a banker that I may help as I might choose to when another is in trouble."

"Of course not. But everyone has their own value, and a word between certain people might have a richness that others lack." Loki was watching her. "Regardless. If I were going to ask your ladyship anything, it might be to ensure the boundaries of the promise made before the Queen. I've gone, and yes, I've come back quicker than I planned. But I'm still no help to anyone kept here in the palace, and I might go so far as to say I'm not as helpful as I could be if I had to remain solely in the capital. The option to move through Alfheim would be… useful."

"All Elves are children of the Queen, and her word lays over the realm like the sky." It was an old saying, meant to comfort the young. In this context, Imda meant something else. A guarantee, of sorts. Loki's face said he understood, and he was listening very carefully. "I think I would not be remiss to say that if I had, as in fact I did, advocated before the Queen for your honor, and that it was suggested to me that you did not need to remain in Midgard but now must instead step beyond this city to do what you vouch is your work, then it would then be up to my _discretion_ to continue to advocate for your freedom. For a road of Alfheim is much closer to us here than the strange sprawl of a human city. I think if, say, my word were _challenged_ by another's word, I would win that challenge. I am confident in that. If it even occurred to that other to make that challenge."

He studied her, his face tense but grateful. He did not miss the risk she was taking - on the behalf of two realms. A third if she included Asgard itself. And to be honest, she usually didn't. It was a personal dislike she was still working on. "Ambassador Imda, I formally ask for your discretion in this matter, that you might continue to advocate for my freedom at the risk of your honor. I will continue to guard that honor as best I may, as I did with my quick return, and with that vow meant for Queen Farbauti, whom I have the utmost respect."

Imda studied Loki, and thought of her Queen's recent request. She knew perfectly well what Farbauti would like to see come out of this. "You have what you ask, Prince Loki." She crossed her arms across her desk and leaned forward, still looking down at him but with a much slighter lean than she needed for her fae attendants. She grinned, a big one that spread across the rich azure of her face. This part was simply for her own sake. "And a moment to speak plain."

"Of course."

"Just between us, don't be alone with a single son of a bitch in this place if you can help it."

He blinked at the sudden and easy familiarity, backing his way towards the door in that polite and noble way the Asgardians had. "Hard lesson learned?"

She rolled her eyes and picked her tablet up again by way of a wave goodbye. There were diplomatic missives to check off, and maybe a cup of that good wine. "I miss my father's old farming caves. You never saw the hanging mosses screwing each other over for a bolt of diamondweave silk, just to score points at the latest royal soiree. That said, young prince, it does make for a good show - _if_ you're clever enough to keep your head above the fray."

. . .

The ambassador's vow didn't exactly give him a badge of access, but a good grimace and a snarl would get Loki to most places within the palace. And the rest, here and beyond its walls? Oh, well, he had plenty of tricks for _that_. He might not have slipped the guards and run between the worlds back when he had the chance, but so long as he were mindful of at least a couple of rules, he certainly wasn't going to let a good shadow go unused where necessary.

Therefore his first priority after leaving the giantess was the obvious one. Alfheim was not as militaristic as other realms. Their guards were good, but there weren't godless countless mobs of them. So it was an easy thing to slip his way down to the lower floors and their better cells, the places where drunk dwarves who insulted the wrong fairy baronet slept it off, or where a white stag waited for his curse to wear off, or the entire gilded wing where King Oberon had been held, yet made of it a small court of his own for his century away.

Thor's cell would be a very fine one, then, because Aelsa would have demanded that. Can't treat the ascendant son of the nine realms worse than a refugee liege. That meant Loki walked into the Lapis Wing, a gaudy little place whose security consisted of the mundane check-in post with its ledgers and sleepy guards, and also a veil of butterfly-light dust, enchanted to spark into screaming life if it were disturbed by an unauthorized visitor.

It also meant the good invisibility spell, that's all. And for having let matters get this far, Loki wasn't about to begrudge the energy. He slipped through the guards and the glitter with a saunter and a rude gesture on principle, then padded his way down the hall and around its private corners until he spotted Thor sitting on the ground with his legs crossed like a child, rhythmically throwing a ball he must have cadged off a warden against the wall.

 _Ba-dum-tump_.

 _Ba-dum-TuMP_. "Hm," said Thor. "Better velocity."

 _Ba-dump- **PHUMP**_! "Too strong," was that verdict. Loki noticed a slight dent beginning to form in the wall, underlining Thor's words.

"Exciting," said Loki, instead of _hello_ , or _my god man, are you alright?_ or _I'm sorry brother._ He couldn't quite get any of that out of his mouth, so he went with his usual dry bullshit.

The ball stopped. Thor swiveled his head to look at him, and a big grin appeared. "Loki!"

Loki blinked. He hadn't exactly expected happiness. It drove him briefly mute.

"Leamhan tried to ploy me, say you left without regard. But I've watched you at your calls with your friends. Something happened, of course. And now you're back, just as I told him you'd be."

Not a trace of cynicism or doubt. No bitterness, not in that sunny grin.

"I don't think Leamhan liked my confidence in that. And I know by now something's odd there."

"Yes," Loki said, managing that much under the blaze. "Yes, I quite think you're right."

"I'm sure we need to deal with that. Are your friends all right?"

Loki looked around for something to sit on, found a stool smaller than he'd like near the edge of the cell wall. He didn't bother to move it, just dropped onto it unceremoniously, looking at the small sparkles and little mosses living in the floor. "I've had to… recuse myself from the situation." He licked his lips.

"Loki, I'm so-"

"I had to make a choice. I'm… it shouldn't have taken as long as it did. But I'm sure they'll resolve the matter successfully without me." He tried to make it sound confident. SHIELD had long survived disasters before him and even involving him. They'd thrive on this one, too, so his faith was with his friends. But nonetheless, the little pang from guilt's knife took some of the air from his voice. The knife that had been there all along. "You shouldn't be in there. I don't know why you're ruddy apologizing to _me_."

Silence, at first.

"I don't think it's funny, Thor. You being in there instead of me, not this time." He realized he was being defensive about something that clearly hadn't happened, and yet he couldn't stop doing it.

"Quit hammering yourself over it, brother."

Loki glanced up, eyes narrowing.

Thor was still sitting on the floor, grinning in that dumb way he had that wasn't ever actually dumb, Loki privately knew, merely easy and approachable. "Pun was intended." The ball flexed in his hands. Loki could see its abuse now, the way the polymers had torn and pitted. That's what happened to the playthings of gods. "You've been here before, brother, in cells, for situations that aren't always fully clear and maybe aren't always the right reasons. And it's not exactly the same thing, but I feel right in thinking that in all the ways you might pick on me or Odin or anyone else for the things you've lived, you wouldn't go for something that would remind you this much of what you had to survive. Not anymore."

Loki continued to watch him.

"Cells are awful, Loki. Not much to do in here _but_ think." Squeeze, went the polymer ball. There were little glittery bits in the plastics, and they caught the light. "Would bend anyone."

"Leamhan's not trusted by the Queen. She won't back his case if I can find proof that he's done this to you, likely at someone else's request. That's how I get you out of this."

Thor cocked his head. It was obvious what Loki was doing, diverting away from a touchy topic. But he was trying to do it in a way that mattered, that got across what he felt, if not what he would say. "You think _he's_ actually Oberonese."

Loki leaned back on the stool. "I'm no longer comfortable making any assumption without proof. I simply haven't been here." He raised a hand before Thor could protest. "I know. So let's try to take this fault as a positive. I'm coming at this with outside eyes now. Let me think aloud with you. I've got multiple people and multiple factions to consider. Asgard, Alfheim. Our princes, their Queen, the Oberonese, other sides? There's multiple Elven houses jockeying for royal favor every time you turn around, and three different courts if we count Titania's personal one. Aelsa lets them do it, possibly because their nonsense keeps them out of her hair. Why that's important to her, I don't know. That's tangential. The point is, you are currently in the safest place in Alfheim, and I've got the freedom now to move around on your behalf. So I have to start close. That means caging Leamhan instead, in due time - and finding that Mooar, see what he knows about this."

"Leamhan's currently trying to question me. He's circling around, but he's still trying to play to my emotions. The problem is, even knowing that, I'm sure he can twist what I say to his use. Possibly even with an audience."

That one was easy. Loki grinned. "Demand Lady Adenium's presence at all further meetings with Leamhan and any of his associates. If anyone fights you, play your nobility up. The Queen'll back it."

"A thistle burr in the arse would be gentler than that little fae."

"Yes, but the Queen trusts this wee red burr. She told me that much outright, so let's use it to protect you, meanwhile. She might be a better ally than you think."

Thor nodded, accepting that. "Mooar's not an archivist, but he is a private clerk. Leamhan suggested his faction, but let's ignore that. He travels regularly to the outer libraries like the one we visited, but he'll be city-based."

"If what he told you of what he does is true."

"He knew the library's politics, and the advice he gave me was solid enough. You said so yourself. I know you're starting from low trust, Loki, but I think many of these people are the type to lie from a truth. As Leamhan did. I thought about that a lot."

Loki frowned, looking past his brother's head and taking that in. Yes, he would agree with that. It was a particularly slick way to distort things, and it ran certain tactical risks. Only so much you could blur the line between false and true before running into a corner - and he knew where all those little nooks could be. _All right_ , he thought. _Let's file that into the tactics shelf_. "I'll start in Parchment Row. It's where most of the clerks originate, even the factioned ones. They've an academy there, one that's always fighting with the libraries for sane access."

"Gods, is it called that?" Thor's face scrunched.

"Yeah, sometimes they skip imagination and go straight to simply overbuilding the place. The Row's a mess. Can find some terrific rare tomes, though, if you've got the time." Loki shook his head and rose from the bench. "Sadly, I don't. All right, any questions? I've got to go before the guards take evening watch."

"You think Leamhan enchanted my mead?"

The question surprised Loki. "Back in the village? No. Rules. If we'd been mere ugly tourists and that orbweaver I pointed out to you had gotten her nose out of joint, then yes, we'd probably be up in the hills wondering why we're half goat now."

"Then how did that stone get on me? I had his, yes. But the mark of Oberon… if it happens that Mooar didn't plant it on me, then how did it get in my pouch?"

"Damn good question. Very damn good question, Thor. I'll see if I can find out."


	13. Chapter 13

13.

. . .

With such an on-the-nose name like Parchment Row, the hope that follows is an obvious one - that the tight alleys and wending crystal-paned walks of the the district evoke the idea of a fantastical place that humans, fed on a well-rounded diet of stories like Harry Potter, and maybe even familiar with the libraries of Ankh-Morpork, could be imagined with delight.

The dead-eyed look on Loki's face would be the first clue that this is not a hope that is going to be paid off.

In a city strapped together with shine and glitz and the chains of bureaucracy, he would say to a human unlucky enough to be visiting the Row with him, it is unfortunate that the sole bastion of legal sanity is also basically its purgatory. Oh yes, those walkways are crystal-paned, and yes, there is plenty of good, ancient, knotty woodwork making up the walls between clerical offices and private collections. But the Row is otherwise a stolid place, where the aged Archivists of the city don't go because the civilian clerks like to bring up insultingly sensible ideas, like using a good centralized database program to update the very process that nearly drove Thor into a frenzy of murder back when no one was currently under arrest for crimes against the realm.

In revenge, the Archivists, who are, of course, supposed to be politically neutral, _allegedly_ made certain deals to keep the Row at the bottom of the city works lists.

Of course, Loki knew, they actually did it.

This had the intended result of making the local clerks and students clean up their own mess most times, and anyone that has lived with a graduate student during the crunch of exams week knows that this is not a thing that is going to happen.

In Parchment Row, every week is exams week for somebody.

The Row was forty percent ancient woods and glass. The other sixty was made up of stacks of paper and, well, the parchment bundles that gave the Row its name. They had stayed in place so long the locals simply built up around them. They floated sometimes, yes. But mostly because someone had chucked one around with magic in a fit of exhausted pique.

Loki was studying one of those fossilized stacks, one that now doubled as a street sign, looking for an address that was really more like an educated guess, trying to figure out with his logic where an aquatic fae - a glashtyn, said Thor, and Thor didn't know what they were but he did. Shapeshifters and water guardians, an old people - was going to hold a job. He knew there was a small subculture of clerks that worked with the ice-bound Elven sorcerers, who by virtue of overlap often worked on geological matters for the undine out in one of the major tourist regions of the realm. It was a good place to start. If nothing else, maybe metaphorically rattling some cages would draw the fellow out.

If Thor were with him now, he would already be dead from boredom. The thought wasn't as comforting as it could have been. At least Thor wouldn't have been in a cell.

. . .

"We don't have anyone here by that name." The clerk, some eternally grumpy fae in a silky robe with an avian face like a roadkilled ibis, looked down at Loki from its perch. Its voice clacked and clashed, a telepathic voice to match the inhuman mouth. At least it had glanced at their work roster. For all of five seconds, but it had. "A glashtyn? Ye gods. They ooze everywhere."

The look in its eyes suggested Loki wasn't much better in its estimation.

The look in Loki's eyes suggested the clerk could eat shit and die screaming. This was only the sixth office he'd checked on, in a geosurvey dedicated part of the Row, and his nerves were back to old-time raw. Only one of them had even tried to be polite, a front desk receptionist who had clearly been hired straight out of one of the tiny village academies and who was probably still getting his lunch money stolen daily. Loki grinned in a mockery of courtesy. "Thank you for your time."

"Which I'll never have back."

Well, he was done. "My good clerk, at least we'll always have our intact necks."

The ibis-fae reared back in offense at his gravelly tone of easy threat, air sucking in through its curved beak as Loki turned his back on it. "Sir!"

Loki sailed through the door and back into the tight streets, thinking vaguely to himself that if Asgard ever needed a geosurvey team to assess the remaining damage from the time Amora tried to throw Asgard bodily at the Earth, he would, by gods, pay out of his own pocket to contract literally anyone else in the galaxy than these guys.

And then he stopped, there on a narrow walk between two tall structures that contained no less than sixteen businesses each inside them. There was a shadow furtively moving down the alley.

A wet looking one.

Loki liked it when an idea paid off. Cages had been duly, and efficiently, rattled enough to matter.

To its credit, a hand came up, waving him back. "Don't get any closer, Your Highness. Word got around you were looking for me. We need to talk, but you'll want to be safe and public for it."

Loki narrowed his eyes, not in mistrust but calculation. It was the exact right thing to say. Privacy would only endanger them both in this situation. He'd been watching for followers, but this was not well-known territory and that made it complicated. It was that Leamhan's turf, and Loki intended to be as careful as possible within it. It was possible his return to Alfheim was unknown. He'd like to keep it that way. "There's a park on the edge of the Row. Open space. Has a nice cheese cart, or did when I was here last." Which was ages ago, but things didn't change that quickly around here.

"I know it." Eyes peeked out from that shadowy place between parchment towers, grey and watery. Mooar was in a fluctuating state, using the puddles to move. When Thor had seen him, he was in a purely humanoid shape. Now Loki smelled seaweed and salt carrying through the air. "He married a century ago. Now they sell roasted leaves, too."

Gods, _every_ realm was going through a health kick. If Earth didn't stop with its kale obsession, Loki was going to lose his mind. "A half hour, as marked by candle. I'll be there."

The shadow dipped and vanished, the sound of rain sprinkling through the alley.

. . .

To be fair, the roasted leaves actually looked rather good. Loki stayed with the ever reliable hunk of cheese on a stick, because for some damn reason every realm he'd ever walked in the thousand years of his lifetime put food on sticks and sold it for cheap out of iffy-looking carts, and this stick of melty baked cheese was not only tasty but would have taken a year off a mortal's life.

Fortunately for his digestive system, he was not all that mortal.

Loki waited for Mooar, watching people go by. He sat next to a fountain, silently moved benches when an undine popped up to tell him the seat was being held for a friend of hers, and after a while leaned his elbow back enough behind him for it to finally catch the damp. On purpose, of course.

"You're jamming into my side," said Mooar, ignoring the undine meeting her partner nearby. The water of the fountain burped behind him. Loki could smell that salty green again. And horse. An awful lot of horse.

"I know," said Loki. On the whole, he didn't like glashtyns that much, no less their cousin the kelpie, but it wasn't their fault. Loki was generally testy about horse-related topics. Daisy's voice crept into the edge of his mind, cheerfully teasing him. Damn good thing he liked the girl, because there was a time in his life he would have chucked her into a sun for the horse jokes she kept coming up with. "Call it a parallel for my own kin being in a jam."

"It's not my fault."

"I have reason to at least consider that, Mooar, but I need a lot more information. It will help if you're truthful."

"All right, Your Highness. That's a fair request. The hard truth first, then. I _am_ loyal to Oberon."

Loki didn't turn around. Mooar wouldn't have liked to see his face right then.

"But I have nothing to do with any of this, I swear on the water of my blood. King Oberon vouched for my family on the Fae Crossing, ensured we had a place here in Alfheim. We have a promise between us. We do his paperwork, my kin, and we tend his legal matters when he's arrested and away, but we have _never_ been asked to serve in his games and even the high clerks of the Queen will sign off on our work without complaints. We're front-facing, Prince Loki. We have legitimacy, we're a small house, and we stay quiet. We don't play in the dirt - until we're dragged through it." Mooar sounded bedraggled enough to underline it. And truthful. Painfully truthful.

All right, then. "Verdurois."

"I was in town grabbing a set of documents on a river deal between three different undine clans. It's not important, it's just more legalese. You know how it is."

Loki did. He shifted his elbow out of the water-horse's way.

"I saw Prince Thor outside the library when I was done for the day. I stopped early, because I'm not paid well enough to deal with undine nonsense longer than I need to. I didn't see him inside, he was in the storage rooms. I found that out when I spoke to him. He was, um, the afternoon librarians had him going through trash, essentially, and I didn't want His Highness to feel maligned by that, so I thought I might help. He didn't want any. He knew it wasn't coming to much, just scraps of schedule, and he seemed quite down, and he wanted his peace. I spoke to him for a while and then I left him to it, because as a rule you should never meddle in noble matters unless you're prepared for the shit to follow. Your Highness." The tone turned peevish on the last words, understandingly.

Wet limbs came up a moment later, long horse legs at first melding with the flow of the water into not quite as long human arms. Mooar folded them atop the ledge of the fountain, dropped his long chin down, and stared across the park. His ears were still equine, poking out of the wet hair.

Loki watched him do it, studied the tired expression. He believed the fae. But. "Unfortunately, this isn't enough to help."

Mooar shook his head, dripping water along the marble. "No, it isn't. Words alone never solve anything in Alfheim, and certainly not debated words from but one witness. Proof might, and money definitely, but this is about honor, too, I'm sure."

"To an extent. I'm pragmatic on that topic."

"An oddity among Asgard's noblemen."

"Tell me." Loki's voice turned sourly amused. "What about the stone?"

The wet eyes turned to Loki, horse's eyes gone big and black and surprised. "What stone?"

Loki stared into Mooar's face, narrowing his own in a peculiar way. He didn't specialize in truthsayer magic, and nor was he a telepath, but enough pointed aggression and a good fake-out did him fine in a pinch. The aura of threat build around him. "The stone."

"I don't know what you're talking about!" The man's torso, still mostly equine, reared back in new panic.

Also a real reaction. Loki broke his stare. "No, you don't." He frowned. "I'm sorry for the implied threat. Someone put one of Oberon's marques on Thor."

"How the hell did they even get one?" Mooar didn't approach again. He seemed suspended in the water of the fountain, well away from Loki. Fair enough. It didn't matter, he wasn't here to make friends. "Those stones are supposed to be given only to Oberonese hands, to mark his favor. There's a limited number in circulation."

Loki rubbed his palms together. Finally, a small detail to follow. "Well. That leaves me with two possibilities. One, it's a real marque and someone in your king's faction is playing silly fuckers, or two, it's _not_ a real marque and someone else is playing silly fuckers. Who's currently feuding with Oberon?"

"I don't know, Highness."

"Give me something. A list."

The water splashed. Mooar desperately wanted to leave and was showing it. "Everyone, eventually, somehow. The city Houses are all vying for rank, so they've never liked this outlander king being absorbed into the upper hierarchy so comfortably by Queen Aelsa. Queen Titania hasn't spoken to her king in ages, but I don't know anything about that. They go through things. It's a unique relationship. The oldland fae don't like him because _his_ ancestors fucked off to Midgard to build a kingdom, then came crawling back when the humans began to erode their taken land. I don't know, Prince Loki. There's always a lot of people looking to cut the King off at the knees, and it doesn't help that he's always been a shifty, boisterous sort himself." The water turned black, dripping around Mooar's face. "You could seek audience with him, see if he will take time to speak, or even vouch for your kin's freedom."

Not a chance in hell, not yet. Loki wasn't about to go to a fae king with his hand open, not without a good backup and maybe some blackmail for safety. Not in Alfheim, not anywhere, and certainly not with infamous King Oberon. The look on his face got that across.

Mooar sagged, the water level of the fountain changing and greening. The undine on the other side of the water whipped on him, saw Loki still sitting there, turned crystalline clear at the look on his face by way of elemental paling, and resumed talking to her friend as if nothing in the world was going on behind her. "I can at least give you a writ with my name for his audience, if you do choose to seek him."

"I'll accept that. Send it to the palace, under the Queen's seal. I'll get it there if I need it. No hurry." Loki allowed himself to relax. The interrogation, since that's what it really was, had gotten him the barest amount of information he could have hoped for. It was a start, in any case. "I need to know Leamhan's angle into this. I need to know how your king is tied in. I need to know how one of his marks got into Thor's things. And I need to know how to shove it all into a queen's court with a bow so she can clap her hands and declare this whole mess a loss and let my brother go."

"You need the stone, then. And you need a witnessed alibi." Mooar was drifting further away. "The stone is probably still with your brother's captors, as evidence. But if I were you, I wouldn't go back to the palace until you have to."

"Well ahead of you on that."

Mooar was now almost fully submerged. "If you need my testimony… I'll show up. I will. For my name, not my king's. You need something more if you want it to stand, but it's still the right thing to do, so I'll do it."

"Thank you, Mooar."

"I'm sorry about all this. I just wanted to help the prince on a bad day."

Loki sighed and got up from the bench, drying out the back of his tunic with a flick of his fingers. "It wasn't your fault, Mooar. You'll know when I find out whose it really is."

"Gods help the bastard, eh?"

Loki grinned, bitter and toothy. "Gods help them, indeed."


	14. Chapter 14

14.

. . .

Loki knew he had flaws. Before the Gods themselves, he would admit he had some big ass personal problems, and he would cheerfully lay them out when it suited him, but if someone else tried to point out those flaws to him, well, it was a pretty good bet that the king flaw - denial most supreme - was going to kick in. His friends knew this, and sometimes they even won that rare bet against his problematic nature. That fight sometimes even made him happy, in a paradoxical way.

But regardless of _that_ , one of his personally most beloved flaws, an issue he flatly refused to acknowledge _as_ a problem, was an absolutely donkey-like stubbornness in the face of being told he was wrong or that he had made a major tactical mistake. Whenever faced with a solid and incontrovertible fact that he'd somehow munged up, he was inclined to go back and revenge himself upon the truth like unholy hell.

Which is why he was currently stalking around the private employee entrance to the main city library and its monastery of ancient Archivists, working on coming up with a sound but psychologically devastating attack that would get his target - whichever one - to break protocol and vouch before the Queen that, really, two Asgardian royals had in fact sauntered into town just to look at ruined genealogies and, with Mooar to assist, a box of forgotten silverware receipts.

This would break probably ten thousand years of established archive routine, and not a few psyches would have nightmares over what he wanted to do to them.

Loki didn't give a damn. He knew this wasn't his finest quality, but he also didn't care about that. Lady Adenium had tripped him up, made him mad. Mostly with himself, but, well, that was the old flaw in action. If he could swing it, someone was going to _eat_ those receipts when he was done.

The truth might set you free, but in Loki's experience, it was just as often used as a whipping chain. His feelings about chains were on record. In all-caps.

It was going to be High Archivist Milkmane or the girl Ayelah, coming out that door at sunset. It would be easier if it was the assistant, but the idea of chewing up and spitting out a genuine ancient had a certain thrill to it.

It was probably going to be the girl.

The sun glittered, turned a rich coppery gold, and began to burn its way down into the horizon's edge as Loki drew deeper into velvet shadows. He waited, because he could be dangerously patient when he felt like it, and he watched that door, and he had a dramatic plan in mind, because he always did.

It was the girl.

. . .

Ayelah didn't go straight home. She went into a pub, a surprisingly cozy little nook on the edge of the city, where the woods crawled right up to the crystal towers to remind the Light Elves who was really in charge when the magic hit the skids, and Loki was glad of her choice of direction, because he was ready to be a bastard, but he had certain limits on what kind of a bastard to be.

Also he'd never seen this bit of the city before, and it was quite nice, really, another reminder that the layered bureaucratic nightmare was not all there was to be in the city of light, and maybe that would mean something in context of what he was prepared to do.

He slid into the seat across from the girl, deciding to not physically block her into her private booth, and when Ayelah realized she was no longer alone, she straightened up, stiff, as he lounged back with his hands clasped together in front of him like a job interview. "Oh, gods," she said, or rather gurgled in surprise. His reputation outside of SHIELD was still terrible, and that could be useful on occasion. "You."

"Me," said Loki, full of acidic good cheer. "How's work?"

"Work… is fine…"

"Any luck with those genealogies of ours?"

Her hesitation was a physical thing. "They… there's going to be some missives, sent to the All-Father. When, when the paperwork is cleared…."

"Which will take time." He was still grinning, all teeth and all darkling light. "A lot of time."

"Um."

"I have no interest in hurting you. It wouldn't help anything."

Ayelah didn't look comforted by his blunt statement, but her words became a little firmer. "The palace sent their intelligence man over, he questioned us as part of the routine, look, we've nothing to do with the trouble-"

"No, but nor did the Archive choose to help."

It didn't matter that he'd taken the seat across, didn't matter that he'd left no traps or tripwires, or brought a heavy to glower in the corner, some local redcap goblin with a face like a hatchet. Ayelah looked just as trapped as if he had. "We _can't_ , we're supposed to be neutral, and-"

"Neutral my entire cracked arse, everyone knows what the Archive did to Paperwork Row in a fit of pique, and there's a dozen other dirty little stories like that one around every corner. They can't lie to a liar, Ayelah, not to me. But you. _You_ actually care about the truth. You _like_ to help." The grin widened, became the conspiratorial grimace of one who knows.

He went harder in, just like he planned, not giving the wide-eyed and slack-faced Ayelah an opening to protest. "It's not what you wanted, the Archive, is it? You saw the palace of knowledge when you were young, where supplicants come to learn, and when you got older they gave you your robes and taught you your prayers before those walls of books, and it's all a big joke. A circular hell of paperwork, and it's like that because someone with power decided it should be like that, and now all that wonderful knowledge isn't a sacred tool of the mind, it's a moneylender's bludgeon. Out of reach, out of touch, lost to most. The restrictions are there to be sure of it. Unless they have power. Or unless they can pay the fare to cross into the promised land. Money can be perfectly neutral, someone might tell you, but it's always said by someone that has an awful lot of it."

Ayelah looked stricken, the steel shine of her face going matte and grey. He'd dug the knife in _hard_. It wasn't her he wanted to hurt, it was that _truth_. If he got his way, he'd turn her into the weapon he needed, and by proxy help her in the long run deal with that truth.

But she was going to have to agree to it.

By that look on her face, it was going to be easier than he expected. She'd told them the truth about the genealogies when she had the chance, and how their magics worked, and the brothers hadn't had to sign a single waiver. She'd gone a toe over the line, when by rules she should have kept her mouth shut.

Loki hadn't been in Alfheim the way Thor had needed, but he'd been there for that, and he'd been there to see the girl jump forward, _wanting_ to be helpful. He'd seen her face then, and it matched what he saw now. Ayelah shifted in her seat, and something in her was trying to fight. Plaintive and small, but she hadn't withered yet the way men like Milkmane had. "Why is your brother being picked on for this? He's only ever been a hero. All the stories I've ever seen, he tried to do the right thing, fight for others."

"The oldest gag in the book, I expect. Wrong place at the wrong time, and someone thought they'd be extra clever, pulling that joke behind my back. It was probably a bonus for the field agent returning to whoever is benefiting from this. 'I pulled one over on Asgard, behind Loki's own back!' I know my reputation better than anyone, it's going to be resume fodder for bastards."

Leamhan, of course. Leamhan, the Queen's untrustworthy intelligence officer, who thought he was sly, getting to Thor behind Loki. He started to grimace again at the thought, stopped himself.

Oh, yes. He was going to destroy Leamhan personally. "I need your help. The one thing no one is going to expect is the truth, the honest truth, backed by the Archive. The palace can't say we spoke untrue if truth itself vouches for us. I would never ask someone like you to lie. Leave _that_ to me."

Ayelah leaned forward, her brows knotting together over dampening eyes. "But the protocol-"

"Is itself a lie, a weapon, and built on the very un-neutral concept of leaving people to hang when _knowledge itself_ knows different."

"I'm not the person to break the rules, I'm sorry." There was a waver in her voice, a weakness.

Loki stayed ruthless, seeing the cracks and wedging himself into them. "If not you, who? Who do I go to for help, to try and get them to see it my way? An old man who's benefitted richly from his age and his place and those very rules for thousands of years or more?"

"An old man who could destroy _you_."

Loki grinned at the little bit of spitfire. She was recovering. Good. "He could try, Lady Ayelah, and he might succeed at first, but he'd bleed trying, and it only takes a little blood off a body like that to leave me standing by the end of it. I even hoped it would be he to leave the library first tonight, not you. I'd ruin him and get what I want, but it wouldn't leave the situation any better than how I found it. And the strange thing is, mistress, I _like_ improving things. I do it my way, which can be upsetting to many, and sooner or later I'll tear up that library for their part in fucking with my family, but if _you_ help me do it, starting now, we can make it happen in such a way that it can be made better. The way it _ought_ to be."

She watched him, and her eyes said she was starting to believe.

"Over his old, dry corpse and all the others like him, if it comes to that. I'm not a particularly good person, mistress, not like the tales of your mighty Thor, but I'm still a prince, and I've got rules and benefits of my own behind that title. I like knowledge, Ayelah, very much, and I don't like prisons. These things we can prove for true."

"Truth again."

"It's freedom, or it's another weapon, and sometimes it's both. Tell them in the palace the truth when I need you to, nothing more, vow your life to that honesty just the way you would if Archive protocols weren't chaining you, and I'll see to it you weather the consequences. All of them. You'll come out of this safe, and, in time, you and your honesty will stand tall among those left when I go after this entire nonsense bureaucracy."

She was staring at him now, and her eyes were huge. "You really are telling me the truth. Someone has your brother in trouble, and your response is to not only prove his side of things, but destroy the entire system that helped get him there. You'll go after the _city_."

He was grinning again, not his sanest look. "It's a hobby. I think long term, when I think of revenge."

"I've heard you're mad."

He shrugged, not offended. "I go through streaks. They made me angry, Lady Ayelah, and I'm not on Earth, where I keep to a certain peace. The rules, these guards, whoever it is behind this rigged game that's got Thor in a cell. I am not kind when I'm angry, but I pay my debts well, and no one goes after my family but _me_ \- and really, I've given that up. It's shite loyalty, but it's real enough. Help me, or best get to the safety of the countryside when I find another way to do this. You'll have time. A few days for some of it, at the very least. A few years for the rest. But someone's going to pay out blood."

"I'll help you."

"You better say so for certain, Lady Ayelah, because when _I_ make an oath, I'll see it through 'till my teeth grind down."

"Prince Loki, I'll help you. I'll help you, because you're being cruel and you're also right. The way we sell knowledge is horrible. All I ever wanted was to teach." Ayelah leaned forward, and she looked absolutely terrified, but also brave. He liked that, too. "You send your word when you need me at the palace to bear witness, and I'll even try to get the ledger out of Milkmane's desk for real proof. He goes to sleep early, and that's why you didn't see him first. He sleeps in the archive these days, in the back with the rare finds like a bloody dragon and his hoard, but he likes me because I'm _pretty_." There was a specific bitterness to the way she said the word, and Loki was glad he hadn't been too cruel to her, only to the system itself. The girl deserved none of it. "I can get that ledger, he barely does any of the real work anymore."

"You do all that, and you won't fear anyone in the years to come, and you'll never need to fear me. On my word." Loki put his hand out, and he knew it would feel cold because he made sure it would. It would be one more small thing to frighten her, and by odd virtue of that, be less afraid of him later.

She took it, and she didn't wince, and that told him she'd bought in. Better to have the bogeyman on your side than leave him an enemy.

Loki knew his own reputation very well indeed.

Ayelah took her hand away. "One more thing, Highness." She glanced around, as if their last several minutes of collusion hadn't been treasonous enough to the balance of the city. "I think it might be important to your brother, and to you. The genealogies. I took another look after you both left. I was curious, and old Milkmane bade me to stand guard while they sorted out the damage paperwork. It took them _hours_ , of course, so I looked." She bit her lip. "I… don't think there _was_ any damage, not exactly."

Loki blinked. "What?"

"I-I mean that someone seems to have simply… stopped updating the genealogies. Before even His Highness Thor was born. Well before. There was a listing for the All-Father's wedding to the good Queen Frigga, and from there someone should have tied in a new bundle of parchment. You know, new era, new section of the book, as clean a symbol as that. Not a surgical removal, sir, but a history entirely ignored."

"What in _hel_?"

Ayelah shook her head. "I couldn't even begin to speculate, Your Highness. I'm sorry, I don't have more answers than that."

He leaned back, ordinary and calm again, no threat at all. Loki kept his promises. "No, but you've given me more damn good questions." He shook his head. "This ridiculous mess. By rights I should be focused entirely on that mystery, but first…"

"So who's behind this? Do you know? I assume you've a target."

"I've got dead to rights the agent who put this into action, but who he's working for?" Loki was still looking away, trying to think. "Less certain. He works for the Queen, but he's not a loyalist."

"Watchman Leamhan?"

That got his glance back to her, sharp and immediate.

Ayelah laughed, already not as nervous. "That annoying little man is the one that came to question the Archive. He's city watch, and he strutted in to prove it was his case, arresting a prince of Asgard. We see him all the time. Of course _he_ gets access to the library as he likes. I assumed he had palace sponsorship."

"Do you know anything about Leamhan personally?"

"No, but as I say, he's here constantly. Always alone. He reads, he meets one of the other archivists for sup once in a while, he goes off again. He's in regularly, oh, once or twice a week at least."

Loki watched her. Every once in a while, despite his mistakes and his past evils, the universe gave him a gift for free. He, no fool, knew when those showed up and was properly thankful. The girl leaving the archive instead of the old man had been the greatest boon he could have asked for, and now he was glad he'd given her his vow. Ayelah was earning it in buckets. She was never going to have to pay city rent again. Hel, he'd buy her a house in the pristine countryside if this worked out the way he wanted. "How regular? Soon?"

"Tomorrow night, like as not. Once early in the week, once later, no matter what's afoot. I think he only skipped his routine once, and that was because there'd been a murder in the palace. That was ages ago. He still came by the next day. I remember he was tired, but he took his time here, same as ever."

Loki leaned forward. "I am very glad to have met you, Lady Ayelah, and I will keep my promise. I'm going to be lurking the archive again tomorrow, but on my word, you'll never know and I'll cause no trouble for anyone there."

She giggled, a small and young sound, still a little frightened of him. "But you're going to cause trouble for Leamhan."

" _Oh_ yes."


	15. Chapter 15

15.

. . .

Loki sat, dangling his legs like a hyperactive child, on the edge of a nobleman's rooftop, a sloped and dazzlingly lovely sheaf of opalescent shingles with him its dark gargoyle, and all that light gave him something to do, magically, looping the easier veil of near-invisibility around himself and adapting it to the shifting color dancing around him. Below was the main visitor's entrance to the archive, and he didn't feel like wandering around the sidewalks in shadow when he could sit cozily, hate, and eat the snacks he bought from local carts while waiting for his target to arrive.

There were still dozens of questions he had, of course, and most of them could be answered by pinning the good watchman Leamhan to a wall via a half dozen knives and his own sheer vindictive will, and regardless of if he actually planned on doing that or not - he hadn't decided - Loki went over some of them while he lounged.

 _How did that Oberonese marque get into Thor's pouch?_

 _Who gave the order to tangle an Asgardian prince up in an apparent scheme to destabilize the throne of Alfheim?_

 _What passive enchantments were put on that watchman's stone and where is it now?_

 _What was a city watchman doing in the village of Verdurois in the first place?_

 _Was he watching us from earlier, perhaps starting from our very first visit to this library, seeing as we cross paths here? Why?_

 _What's the Queen's angle in all this, why does she seem acutely aware of this particular scheme but intent on acting blind?_

 _What's the most painful way to kill an Elf?_

All right, that last one was just a particularly hostile daydream, and it wouldn't help him in the long run. Loki cut it from the list. He tossed the last of the roasted nuts he'd bought into his mouth and dusted his hands off in the air. Then he pulled a knee up and rested his chin on it, thinking vaguely to himself about the last time he'd been imprisoned, and how he'd asked a human to advocate for him then. Asking Phil Coulson to help him, not yet a full friend, knowing the man would do nothing but hunt the truth, no matter if it would become a hard one.

Coulson was an honest man. Loki knew his strengths, and honesty wasn't typically there. But now he had two witness cards in play, both where their truths would be far more valuable than a lie from him, and that was a damn good start. Good for a first day's work.

Evidence, well. He was on his way. If he had to cut it out of Leamhan's torso, so be it.

First, Loki needed to know who the bastard was really loyal to. And to that, he had a good feeling the path to the answer started in the city's great library.

A visit twice a week, no matter what. Twice a week, and sometimes Leamhan met an archivist for supper. How noble, how mundane, how educated.

And what a simple method to hide a spy's assignation.

It was, in a way, the first real fuckup on Leamhan's part. Probably the only one Loki was going to need. The city might be Leamhan's turf. But all libraries, even hostile ones, were Loki's territory, and his stalk was far more merciless.

He was still angry, of course. Dangerously angry.

Loki grinned, that old jackal's feral smile, and he watched the long shadow of Leamhan approach the entrance of the great old library.

. . .

Loki didn't need a lot of complicated magic to follow Leamhan around the guts of the library. Shadows and candlelight worked well for his outline, and the soft rustle of paper became the same as the shurring whisper of the fabric of his clothes, and his footsteps echoed behind Leamhan's in near silence. He stayed well back, knowing that men are at their most alert when they know they're doing wrong, and also suspecting that Leamhan had been at this game of his for so long that he may well have gotten lazier about it.

It all depended on how much he thought to be afraid of Loki, and since the bastard thought he'd pulled a gig over on him… the jackal's grin was still wide and bright on his face. No, Leamhan probably thought terribly highly of himself, despite not getting Loki's capture solidified before the Queen.

And also, as a bonus, he quite possibly didn't know that Loki was now back and loose in Alfheim. Ambassador Imda would have signed papers on the matter to keep things clear with Queen Aelsa, but Loki would have bet half Asgard's gold that clever, amused Imda wasn't in a hurry to finalize such boring paperwork.

He spotted Ayelah early on, lifting her head to watch the watchman go by, and her face was the perfect employee's mask. If she saw or suspected the shadow lurking his wake, she gave no sign of it. Better that way. Her part was set, Loki had no need to complicate her further. He moved on, staying on the trail.

Leamhan seemed to like a recent section, collections of recent political decrees, council moves, things that he would absolutely need special palace clearance for. These works had a tactical benefit many Elvish houses would kill for - easy access to them would be invaluable. But the archivist he approached in that wing obviously knew him and guided him through. Loki watched them chat with casual postures, even as they watched the rare other patron to be sure they weren't gaining too much obvious attention.

Loki studied the archivist from his hidden corner, marked his face well. A younger Elf, one who no doubt quickly got his place here through those very same politics. A collaborator, possibly, as much as a friend. The question still lingered. Collaborating on the behalf of whom?

He watched the young archivist grin and slap the back of Leamhan, who finished looking at his chosen tome after a half hour. Then one hand along another, an elegant handclasp between old friends.

Loki didn't miss the tiny slip of paper passing between fingertips. His eyes narrowed, and his lips pressed together into a razor's line. Not _just_ a collaborator. Now he was equally likely to be a handler, a cut-out between Leamhan and his true loyalties.

He knew the city had that deep line of corruption in it. Every bureaucratic structure grew one in time, like old rot, but the public line had always been that the Archive and its great network of libraries all through the realm was untouched by such rot. Loki was a cynical sort and knew all along that too was probably a lie, and yet seeing proof with his own eyes hurt a bit.

Goading Ayelah with the truth had been easy, because there were certain things he believed in, utterly. And knowledge, the sharing and understanding of it, that was a sacred thing to him. To know, to watch this happen…

Loki burned the face of the young archivist in his mind as Leamhan prepared to leave, not just a mark but a target. Someday, when he was ready and he struck at the entire structure of this place, that man was going to be one of the first pillars to be pulled down. _Someday_ , he thought, still in Leamhan's lengthening shadow.

He had a lot of ideas about how that attack was going to work.

. . .

Leamhan, like Ayelah, was also wise enough to not go straight home, but nor did he bother to stop anywhere that might have shaken his silent tail. He whisked by a stall for a bite, and he stopped to talk to a night's watchman, and that Elf, too, didn't see the figure in the shadows just a few meters up the street watching them both. But this other watchman was just that, some officer out on his job, and Leamhan continued on after a while. The route he took was moderately winding, but still, Loki sussed out quickly where home really was. A nicely sized apartment, midway up one of the finer crystal towers on a central ring of the city. Just the barest touch about Leamhan's paygrade, easily waved off with a good family name.

Loki watched Leamhan enter his home, magelights flickering on to welcome him and follow him around the apartment, and then Loki wandered off for a late-night snack of his own, as he might as well enjoy himself while waiting for those lights to go dark again.

He took his time. There was an angry old Dwarf running a late-night cart a few streets away, easily found by nose. Loki had no idea what sort of story brought the curmudgeon out of Nidavellir and into this daintier realm, but he sold good sandwiches to the few sorts willing to try non-local food. Mostly tourists and merchants tired of the aesthetic, it seemed, and Loki lounged against a candlelit pole, watching men attempt to scam each other and not trying very hard to succeed. This was the real Alfheim to him, like the villages. Lies and magic and secrets, all of it running underneath the glitzy facade.

He was still wiping breadcrumbs and garlicky grease off his hands when he returned to Leamhan's tower, and he was sure to not leave any trace of himself behind when he unlocked the door with a soft snap of his fingers and a push of his palm.

From the outside, Leamhan had chosen a moderately upscale home. From within, it became immediately apparent that either he was rich enough to run a merchant's gig when he wasn't a watchman, or that he had quite an _affectionate_ patron. Loki peered through the darkness, looking at the hanging fountain and its danglingly intricate gemwork, and the nook stacked high with freshly delivered handbound books marked with rare leathers and metalwork ribbon, and he knew it was the latter.

He didn't turn on a light, of course. A soft murmured enchantment gave his eyes the illusion of light to work with, instead, and his footsteps stayed soft. From somewhere several rooms in and up a small staircase, Loki could hear the soft wheeze of a a man well asleep.

It was the wrong way to begin, and it was a sure sign of those flaws in Loki - vengeance, anger, stubbornness - but nonetheless, he went to the staircase first and padded his way upstairs and down the short hall to the bedchamber. More fool Leamhan, there were no traps or alarms in most of the apartment. Loki caught the scent of something active in what seemed to be a small office, and also the larger book room next to it, and he decided to go there next.

Meanwhile, Loki stood in the doorway of Leamhan's chamber and looked down at the sleeping figure, studying him. The man slept light and easy, and Loki's shadow didn't quite touch him. Almost innocent, that figure. Loki grinned as Leamhan snored, knowing he would come back before he left.

He went back towards the office, pausing outside the boundary of the faint but intricate magical ward. He reached out his magical senses, looking for flaws or the creator's rune-mark, and found the latter quickly. It had a snare in it as well, a good one that would bind an intruder as well as scream warning to the maker. It took Loki three seconds to suspend it and slip through.

For Loki, that fine little bit of magical netting might as well have been a glowing sign reading 'START RUMMAGING FOR CLUES HERE.'

 _Idiot_ , thought Loki with satisfaction. A good spy with things to hide would have layered trap-runes everywhere, leaving no hint as to which place actually hid the goods. Now he had a piece of Leamhan's mind to himself, and he kept the shadows close around him as he rummaged along the shelves, across the central desk, ran his hands under the chair, and even flipped rugs for good measure.

He had to give the man half a point. Anything Loki needed wasn't in that first and obvious sweep. He stayed hunkered in the center of the office, the rugs put back exactly how he'd found them, and then he looked up at a series of paintings along the wall. There had been nothing behind them - Loki had done the obvious and peeked during that first quick sweep - but now he studied the pictures themselves.

Landscape paintings. The glinting Elvish city, the deep forest beyond, and a third that took Loki a while to puzzle out. It was familiar yet alien - a mountain's pinnacle rising above a deep plain, draped with a soft cloud. Not a richly green landscape, but scrubby and ringed with tall bushes. There were figures in the painting, small people between those bushes. Gardeners of some kind. Then it clicked, sharp. He'd _seen_ that place, on Earth, a region now full of highways and sprawling suburbs. It was one of the smallish mountains of Athens, a memory from long ago.

 _Greece? Why there?_ Loki stared at the painting, putting together what little he knew. Leamhan's family had made the crossing with all the rest as the changing landscapes and shifting beliefs of Europe drove the fae away. Only a handful of them stayed behind on Earth. Even Loki didn't know where most of them were.

But Leamhan had had some connection specifically to Athens. The fae peoples traveled in the ancient days, and the young world had been theirs to toy with, so that in itself wasn't remarkable. This half-elf kept this particular image, though. Athens _meant_ something.

Loki filed that away with its tickling resonance, and let himself into the collection connected to the office with the same magical ease.

. . .

Books, of course. Some of it trash, some of it ledgers of political discourse that Leamhan had been taking notes on. That in itself was some proof of evil intent, it showed that the good and loyal watchman kept records on matters that weren't his purview, to give to someone that would likely benefit from an inside ear. Loki selected a small tome, one that recorded a brief but private interview from a few months ago with several inter-realm ambassadors that Leamhan should have been providing security for and nothing else, and slipped it into his tunic. It was not the proof he was looking for, but it would go to character and intent.

He kept looking, wrinkling his nose and running his hands along paper, looking for magical traces of something, anything he could use more directly.

It took twenty minutes, but finally he struck paydirt. His hands had been running along the side of a tall bookcase, one that he'd kept coming back to for its dimensions seemed not quite right somehow and Loki liked to trust his instincts. The switch had an illusion on it, a nigh invisible one due to its _inertness_ , and Loki's teeth bared at the recurrence of such small, subtle magic. Leamhan had one innate magical talent, and he used it well.

The cache it hid was similarly illusioned, a final barricade. Loki's fingers tickled through it, plucking free a small pouch. With another sniff to be sure this item was not trapped, he tugged the pouch open and dumped its stone into his palm, wondering what he would find.

It was small and green, a perfect cabochon emerald set in gold filigree. Atop it hovered a marque, that noble signature that said whoever held it carried noble favor and noble protection.

Not Oberon's.

Loki studied the stylized, twining ivy for a long, blood-pounding minute, trying to make sense of the knots here. What Leamhan was doing, why he acted for this faction, why. Over and over the question. Now he knew for whom.

Queen Titania.

"Shit," breathed Loki. His hand clenched tight around the marque and its pouch, and he had one of his answers, loaded with all new questions.

He could wake up Leamhan, force him into talking. But he would have to contend with the possible fallout of that. Leamhan was favored by a dangerously powerful party he hadn't expected, Oberon's own equal and an unexpected enemy, and Loki was going to have to step carefully when he approached her court.

Not the shadows for that, no. That would be unwise. He would have to go directly, one royal house to another. There were rules to certain confrontations at that social level, rules even he didn't want to break until absolutely necessary.

Essentially a state visit, in the way he hadn't wanted for King Oberon. Now he had no choice.

But for the present, he could leave a message for Leamhan himself. A very specific one.

. . .

Leamhan woke in the morning, well rested but unsettled. He shoved himself upright amidst his spidersilk sheets, running his hands through his glinting hair, and the sunlight danced in.

He blinked a while, one arm laid atop a knee, and he tried to make sense of why he felt put off. His dreams had been deep. He reached out his senses as that morning light continued to shine in his eyes - he knew he wasn't a strong mage, so he specialized carefully in the few spells he knew the best, and his wards seemed untouched.

He winced. Some mornings, if he slept in a little, the sunlight bounced off one of the neighboring towers into his room. Usually he kept the curtains shut to avoid that, but he had been tired and full of joy. The note last night from his Queen had been a kind one, to boot. The plan was going quite well, despite Prince Loki jaunting off to old Midgard the way he had.

The sun lazed into his face again as he shifted on the bed, and Leamhan was just awake enough to find that strange. Suns and stars usually didn't move with someone. Then he woke up a little more and realized the light was striking the side of the eye _not_ facing the window.

He looked down, squinting against the sharp gleam of something reflecting off his pillow, and then he screamed and jerked out of the bed, upright and naked and trembling.

A broken blade, the razor-sharp shards of it scattered across the pillow.

It was a warning, an unmistakeable one, laid bare to him with no proof as to who left it. Leamhan knew, instantly, but the other layer of the murderous joke was just as obvious - he would never _prove_ it was Prince Loki.

Nausea roiled. Gods damn, he thought the man was still away.

He was not safe. If the infamous prince got his way, Leamhan was _never_ going to be safe. Few survived the dark prince when he had cause to make a target. His entire plan relied on Loki seeming distant and uninvolved.

The knife told him differently.

The knife told him the prince had decided this was now _personal_.

Leamhan fled his bedchamber, but he had no idea what to do.


	16. Chapter 16

16.

. . .

Thor watched Lady Adenium glower at the unlucky guard as he delivered his hushed message to her, his arms crossed against him where he leaned against the back wall of his cell. "An issue, mistress?"

She didn't turn around, but her translucent ruby wings fluttered in a particularly aggrieved sort of way. "I'm sure it's of no consequence."

 _Flutter. Flutter._

It was interesting how such dainty little wings got across so much emotion.

Thor pushed himself off of the wall and crossed to the very edge of the cell, close to her. He dropped onto his rump so he was closer to her eye height and sighed. "Well, in my experience, most politics are of no real consequence, but everyone acts like it is anyway, and that makes it an actual problem despite the fact that it's all structured nonsense we made up to stress ourselves further."

The small round face angled towards him, and he saw weary annoyance on it, and also a brief glimmer of speculation and something else.

"I prefer hitting things and talking plainly. Some people think me a brute for that, and I let them. But I pay attention, mistress, and I'm not actually a fool. You don't grow up with a brother like mine without picking up a few tricks. Acting dumber than I am's been great for centuries, I'm not changing now." Thor shrugged. "Someone's screwing around. More than I would say to my own defense."

Adenium turned to face him and her wings still shimmered in the air, stretched and active. She pursed her lips and continued to stare at him, his height now roughly equal to hers, and he could tell that affected her, despite herself. She looked aside, as if making sure the guard had gone. "That idiot, Leamhan, is running late to this very interview he demanded so strongly to have. That guard, who would be under his purview, is telling me it's a small delay. _My_ people have been telling me I might as well go have a drink and place my lunch order."

 _Loki's done something_. It wasn't a question. He did fast work when in a mood, and Thor could damn near watch the clouds gather when Loki had left the other day. It wouldn't help to say that aloud, not as plainly. "Leamhan's vanished, then? That's more than a little strange."

"And it's an action rather favorable to you, isn't it?" Adenium didn't say it with any hostility. "A rock solid case he brings before the Queen, so you'd think he'd be damn sure to keep his investigation moving smoothly. This is most irregular." She looked away again. "She's going to be right again, damn it. Her methods make me berserk, but here we bloody are once more."

Thor wasn't sure who _she_ was, not for certain, but he liked the rest of that. "Has there been trouble with Leamhan before?"

"Not him." She snapped a look at him, seeing if he was trying to play her. But he kept his face open and honest, because he wasn't playing, not really. Loki had suggested her as a sort of guardian, and she was prickly, but she had also proved herself smart and, well, _normal_. He wanted her to talk to him as an equal, and it was working. The suspicion faded and now she looked tired. "There's always a lot of nonsense going on in this court, if I may speak plainly, Your Highness. It's exhausting. Being close to the queen, I'm exhausted rather a lot."

"It's common to every court, mistress. And it is. I don't know how Loki handles it, sometimes. Then again, sometimes he didn't." He frowned. "But anyway. If we're stuck waiting for the wheels of justice to get back on track, Lady Adenium, I've got enough rights as a royal prisoner to call out for a good lunch. May I offer my word and gold and find us both something decent?"

"Are you bribing me?" Adenium didn't sound serious, but still she kept an eye on him.

"No, ma'am. I just rather like eating when stressed." Thor grinned. "Have you ever tried something called pizza?"

She sniffed, not unkindly. "I have not. What is it?"

"A human meal. A delicious flatbread of meats and cheese and sauce. Oh, and some vegetables, if you prefer."

"Sounds awful." Adenium studied him and there was a bright glint in that ruby eye. "I need awful. It's been an awful year, Your Highness. If I say I might know an old merchant runner that can realm-shift within an hour, regardless of the legality of such action, do you know a good place that will take your coin?"

"Madame, I have been recently privileged with that very knowledge."

Adenium puffed a little, and he knew he'd got to the heart of her. "And how is human beer?"

"They try their hearts out on Earth and I credit them for it. It doesn't get me drunk, but it's pleasant stuff."

"We're going to order a _lot_."

Thor grinned, understanding that he'd made a very unlikely friend.

. . .

Queen Titania kept court on the liminal edge of the city, where a network of old crystal archways had been reclaimed by the onslaught of even more ancient vines and grasping tree limbs. The twining arches led upwards into a high court veiled not just with the green, but with all the flowers of the realms the queen had gathered to her. From there, the Queen of the Fae, Oberon's Royal Consort, could see as much of Alfheim as she liked… but whispered word knew she did it mostly through bought secrets and magic mirrors buried in those same arches.

Loki knew about Titania, a little. Frigga had corresponded with her in careful letters, usually using the love of those same flowers as diplomacy. Asgard's gardens had fae cuttings thriving among them, and not a few rare Asgardian species that normally only grew in that realm dug down newer roots here.

Asgard kept one sole cutting sent after Frigga's wake, Loki knew, a mourner's rose that bloomed darkly blue when the night was full dark with no moon. The bush grew well and strong, yet it only ever offered a single flower.

That courtesy between the realms, that respect and grief, got Loki in the door. The bauchan guards marched before and in front of him while a runner sped ahead. The hobgoblin-like men were squat and goatish looking. They had clear, lovely voices, though they barely spoke to him as they walked.

They guided him to the trellis gate that led to the inner court, waiting for some sign from within. It came in the form of a small, clear bell. A moment later, the trellis opened and one of the bauchan stomped the butt of his spear against a specially hollowed out bit of tree. It created a strange and sonorous noise, a drum's echo from an era long gone. The other framed himself in the opened door. "My Queen, my liege, present to thee we do. This prince of gold among our realm of green. We name him now, Loki has come to thee. He begs thy ear and time, my quee-"

"Enough, Friseal. Enough. I grant the prince audience. Step in, young Loki, and don't worry about trying to match my men's words. They are happier where they are, living old memories and wrapped in their older tongue."

Loki moved past the bauchan with his head bent down in reverence, looking at the grey top of his hair. Then he looked at the fae Queen, and wasn't sure what he saw at first. He hadn't known what to expect, but it was not this.

Titania moved, rising up in a moment of alien grace, and that made him see her outline a little better. She was humanoid after all, with a fey and angular grey-bark face crowned with two sharp yellow eyes, but tall and made of wooden curves that made her look like a living bundle of tree branches. Pouring out behind her were her wings - broad springtime petals of rosy pinks and pale greens, dusting the air around her with the smells of grass. Her hair was black and mossy, tumbling down around her like a cloak, and she smiled at him, pointed and inhuman, knowing that she had given even someone like Loki a moment's pause with a look at her true face.

Then she shifted a little, and now she was just as tall, and the fey and angular face became pink and merry and grinning, and all those mosses and greens became her veiling dress and spilling braids. But the eyes were still catlike yellow, and they never broke from him. She was beautiful in both shapes, an old-growth forest that had survived a dozen wildfires and grown something new and strange in those beds of black ash, and she was frightening in a way he hadn't expected. "Young Prince Loki. How odd it is that this is the first time we meet."

"Your Majesty," said Loki with a bow of his head. When his face came back up, he made sure the surprise and confusion was gone from it. She'd won an opening shot off of him. He would have to be careful with what he said. Coming in the front door was no guarantee of his future safety. "I must agree."

"Frigga was so careful about me. She was kind and polite and dangerously wise. She sent you to Aelsa, but not to my knee. You must know I take no offense to this, it was simply sensible of her." Titania dropped back to her seat, a stump that had been cultivated into a small, twisting stool. "The trees have a more… primal whisper to them. Pages tame their words; the magic of books is a kindly cage that helps your kind see. Men and women have come to me for wisdom before, to learn in my presence how to _listen_ , and they've gone away, and many of them delight in what I've taught them… for a while." Her hand flicked in the air, giving hint to their fates. "It's beautiful to witness. And of course sometimes they do come back."

Loki's gaze flickered to the small soulflowers that dotted the overgrown canopy of Titania's private salon. Oh, yes. He knew what she meant. He bowed his head again, wondering if there was a threat in there, too.

"So what does bring you to my court, Prince Loki?" She gestured at another stool when he straightened up, a fat and cushy thing grown from a mushroom and topped with moss. "I hope it's nothing too troublesome."

Loki took the seat and he licked his lips. He watched as she put away some spellbound project of hers with a gesture of her fingers, a glinting orb of green wrapped in leaves. "I would hope not overmuch, but yes, I am afraid there _has_ been a little trouble."

"Mm, oh dear." She sounded neutral. He was sure she knew perfectly well what this was about.

"It seems that an individual," here he chose to use words to allow tasteful distance between his accusations and his accused, "has chosen to use my brother's good reputation for ill, and made him seem like an accomplice to some new plot of King Oberon."

"How can you be sure it's not some jape of Oberon himself?" Titania didn't look at him, still fussing with her magics. None of what she passed her hands over were hostile enchantments, all were illusive pretty things and gems. Like Leamhan's chandelier. It would be rude to attack Loki outright at her court, although to his discomfort there were plenty of other ways to fatally wound an enemy. "Have you proof otherwise?"

"I'm very sorry, Your Majesty, but I do."

Titania sealed away her works and looked behind her for a dappled-brown fawn that had been sleeping in her shadows. She gently lifted it, keeping its gangly legs neatly bundled together, and placed it on her lap, stroking its wide brow with an unearthly hand. She glanced at him, and that yellow eye turned gold and serene. "So. You're Aelsa's weapon, sent to strike me."

Loki reared back and his face immediately went hot at the turn. " _What_?"

Titania flicked her hand towards the trellis door, and the bauchan pulled it shut. It was only the two of them now, the flowers, and the sleeping baby deer. "We're going to speak plainly, Prince, because once the blade's unsheathed it's better to be quick and clean about it." The fawn struggled suddenly. She patted it again until it soothed, one hoof now stretching across her knee. It suckled one of her fingers and looked newly content.

He was now totally off-balance, and he didn't like it one bit. "I don't… I'm acting on behalf of my brother."

"Of course you are." Matter of fact. "Do you act without Aelsa's approval?" She looked at him, saw the answer. "You do. Then whether you knew or not, you act with her goals in mind." Titania tilted her head, not quite pitying. It was the face of a mother with a learning toddler. "Prince Loki, your reputation is _interesting_ , and I bore easily, so do take that in the spirit I intend. You have, should you continue to not get your corpse thrust into the eternal void, the potential to be even _more_ interesting over the next few millennia. But you are still young, though I have no doubt all you Asgard royals feel you've been aged fast of late, and you're simply not more than a pawn on her playing field. Not yet."

Loki sat, stricken. This had left his hands and slipped his control, fast. He wondered if he'd even had a chance, and the old, meaner parts of him would find resentment in that. He swallowed it down, an overdose of dangerous pride. For Thor's sake - and his own.

"Boggart's din, I've been around ages and she still steals the march on me. I figured there would be an afternoon like this one soon enough, but I did not think it would be Frigga's protected little potential to carry the warning." Titania sighed. "Talk to me upfront, prince. I am past games if she's put you onto the board with her eye on what you do. Tell me what you see and what you found, and I'll tell you what Aelsa's smile behind you means."

He wasn't looking at her, but he carefully put his hand into one of his hidden pockets to touch her marque. "Then, simply put, your man Leamhan's not as clever as he hoped. He got lucky when he caught Thor alone and me distracted, and he got even luckier when a man who _is_ loyal to your husband stopped to offer him a kind hand. At some point, of which I admit I am still unsure how it happened, a marque of Oberon was slipped into Thor's gear and Leamhan enacted a raid and an arrest on the village inn we were staying at. He's claiming Oberon has eyes on Aelsa's throne, and that my brother is party to this treason." He detailed a little more, until she looked satisfied.

"And you struck Leamhan's home last night. My frightened little moth. He's fled now. Sent his message and took his heels to the deep woods. He slept so nicely last night, and now this." Reluctantly, Loki looked back to her. Titania sighed when she met his gaze. "You found my gift to him, his message said. It's one of the very first I made, because he cared for me so in the old days. Please let me have my marque back."

"It's the proof I need, Your Majesty-"

"No, I'll _give_ you the proof you need, but only after you understand _why_." Titania's voice turned bitter for a moment, then evened out. "Again, prince. The game is over. It was brief and amusing and I will pray that a lesson has been learned by one that needed it. You have nothing to fear from me today, so I ask as one of royal blood to another, return me the gift I gave my friend and my heart."

Reluctant, Loki took the little cabochon from its hiding place and handed it to her. Between her fingers, it began to gleam with inner light. "Leamhan has wronged my family, and me," he said, not trying to make it aggressive.

"He has." She put the gem away with a flourish, a shimmer in the air leaving no trace. "And that is between the two of you. I will ask, not demand, for I care for my moth and plea to you directly, that you in time grant him mercy. He is badly scared of you now, and what he did, he did for love. Though I did not order it, I will tell you that I did not speak against it when his plan became known to me. Aelsa will know I permitted this, then, and so it is my responsibility."

"Then what are we doing here?" It was hard to not sound frustrated.

"Saving face, prince." Titania resumed stroking the sleeping fawn. "Aelsa is giving me a chance to do that much before she takes direct action herself. So I will tell you why I allowed this, and I will give you what you need, and you will go back to her and tell her what we've said when she asks, and you will know from this day forever that she is not what you see and must _never_ be underestimated. She plays amidst her courting fools, and she could destroy them all tonight if she wished to. She has chosen not to destroy me - and I think, kindly, that is because she understands."

He still felt shell-shocked. "What, Your Majesty, does she understand?"

"She knows what Oberon _did to me_." It came out in a low snarl and the fawn woke again, making a soft, strange noise like no Earthly deer. She bent over the creature, cooing at it in apology, and now she stayed veiled behind the tumble of her hair. "I'm sure you do, too, Prince, and I know those myths of yours, and so there's another point of hers made through fate's twist. I may hope for your sympathy here. The tales, true or no, can wound us."

Loki opened his mouth, not understanding at first. Then he did and he closed it, thinking of Daisy's well-meant teasing and a matter of a certain series of ribald Norse myths, and it struck him in a rush. Tales. Myths. Truths…

 _Athens_.

Leamhan's painting, once a mystery, came to life in his mind. _A Midsummer Night's Dream_. He'd read the play but not recently and it was a human thing so he'd thought it was decent but didn't think on it much at the time. A tangling comedy about Theseus and Hippolyta, and Oberon and Titania, crossed lovers and confusion in the mix before a grand wedding. And the quarrel between the Fae over Oberon's jealousy… Oberon's joke landing on the worker named Bottom, and a love potion gone awry.

A queen made to lust for a man changed to a beast.

Titania was hugging the fawn, and Loki heard the impossible - an ancient queen weep softly, her face hidden to keep her secret. He said, only, "What Oberon did. In the story. It was worse for you than that little comedy likes to say."

"My loves stayed with me. My blossom, my seed, my web, my moth. My moth was stricken hardest, and it hurt us both so much when Leamhan decided to slip off then to Aelsa's court, all for a someday chance. It hurt, because he loved me enough to go away to protect me."

And for that, she'd asked for mercy as if Loki were an equal, not just the near-child she thought of him politically. His face felt cold now, frozen. There was a great deal here she no doubt would not say to him, and that told him the rest.

"Do you know what's so awful about this, prince? There's two things. One is that my king has never understood my anger and hurt. It was a game to him, you see. An accident, and for that he doesn't feel that he must be responsible. Even his stupid old charade that put him in Aelsa's prison, he doesn't understand all of that the way he needs. And the other - the other, damn me to hells…

"I do still love the old ox. I might forgive him someday, if he would just _see_ \- but he hasn't. So my loves act on my behalf and shame him before Aelsa with this dolled up crime." Her voice was calm again, too calm. This was a thing that hurt Titania deeply, and as much as she was willing to speak to him, he could hear resentment as well. Self-resentment. The shock fell away, without pity. Not only sympathy, but empathy. Yes, he'd learned enough in his years of being a fool to feel that. "A game, you see." She sniffled. "A jape, a ruse. Just like his own."

"To trip him with his own hubris."

She laughed, small and girlish and wounded. "Very good, Prince. Just like that."

"Your Majesty…" Loki trailed off, thinking. "This is not the endgame I came to expect."

"No?" There was an eye now in the hair, coppery glinted and dry. Titania would not cry where she could be seen, and he respected that while also knowing it was one of the darker curses of being born to courts.

He laughed, small and dour. "It would be a better universe if people simply talked instead of fought, but that's a rarity enough that it seems a fantasy. So I'm here in your parlor and we're talking, and I don't know what to do with my revenges now."

"You get to be my age, prince, you get vastly more particular about your fights. Besides, a good wordy brawl over truths can be just as satisfying." She straightened, the fawn still clasped in her arms. It was awake now, looking at Loki, and its eyes were bright and supernaturally blue. "Revenges? Not merely against my moth?"

He glanced up at the solar's roof and its veil of flowers. "Your moth, I think I might come to understand what he did. Your tale, _that_ I understand. But the way Leamhan did it used certain flaws that have grown into the city here. Certain corruptions and-"

"Oh, all _that_. Yes, my Leamhan's gotten some fine use out of the greedy idiots at the Archive. They serve him and me, but not for loyalty. Money talks louder than my magic." Her face had fully re-emerged from her hair, and a bit of the sparkle was back in her face. Not all of it, but some. "So you think they've wronged you, too?"

"Ah-"

She whipped a hand in the air, dismissive. "Well, go to. If Aelsa put you on my trail, she knew what you'd uncover. Doubtless that's a benefit to her. I've suspected she's wanted to borrow an off-worlder's ship and shoot that old Milkmane into a white dwarf star for centuries. Can't _prove_ that's what she feels, but I'd be there with a good barrel of wine to share with her if it happened. You set a fire under that library, metaphorically, of course, she'll probably keep you her kindest graces forever."

"Um."

"They call you the silvertongue, don't they?"

"When I've got my feet under me." It sounded like a grudging confession. It was.

Titania laughed suddenly, real and richly human. "I've still got it. Aelsa won't win _everything_ off me today." The fawn bleated and she let it go free, tumbling to the sod and grass at their feet. It wobbled and danced off, still making that strange little noise. A key was in her hand now, small and steely. She gave it to him. "This opens Leamhan's office in the palace. In there, you'll find the evidence lockbox associated with your brother's case. If I were you, I'd take the box, sealed, directly to Aelsa, in private audience with her and that little red grump she likes. A stone will be inside that box. I'm surprised you missed the trick to it."

"To my regret, Leamhan succeeded so well because I hadn't fully committed to helping Thor yet. He showed me the stone Leamhan gave him, but a brief inspection seemed like it was-"

 _Inert_.

"Oh _shit_."

Titania gave him a lopsided smile. "He's not a very good mage, my moth. He's got a bit of shift and one excellent illusive speciality, and wisely, he uses the latter as much as he can. He's so good at being unnoticed when he's not over-confident. And he was, this time. He might have gotten away with it a little longer, but Aelsa likely knew from the beginning what was in play, and you were in the right place to find the trail."

"I missed a passive godsdamned enchantment. _Me_. Leamhan's stone was Oberon's marque all along, and he easily got it through this court ages ago." Loki was dead white and furious with himself. Another simple mistake.

"Don't ruin yourself too deeply, dear prince. We all miss a trick now and again, and oftentimes because we care overmuch." Titania's hands were clasped together on her lap and she looked content. "When you can slip one past us old fae, then you'll know you're in the deeper ocean. And that you can survive it, to boot."

He turned the key over between his fingers, feeling the cold iron of it, realizing that had made Leamhan's office more secure than most. Traditions held power here, like Asgard. He decided to speak honestly, as best he could, without hostility. "I'm sorry your husband wronged you. I don't like that my family became tangled in your revenge, but you were right that I understand your wrath."

"And for what it's worth - this is between us, now, and not for Aelsa. She'll think I'm getting soft, and I can't have that - I _am_ sorry we snared your brother. In short time, if you had not acted for him, or if we had somehow slipped Aelsa's eye, it would have still been resolved and Thor's honor neatly restored. A game and nothing more, as we fae do."

He arched an eyebrow, curious. "With the threat of treason in the balance?"

Titania shrugged. "It's Alfheim, young man. Treason passes for a casual game of Grecian handball here, it's simply not a crime as harshly regarded as elsewhere. Aelsa wins in the end, and the traitors go in the cells for a few decades until they get it out of their system or think up a better plan for next time. No one's scored a point off her yet, and we fae don't try as hard as those Elvish idiots in the city - we just make it look better. She's the top of the food chain here, and you learn to take her warnings when they come. Otherwise, the next day is typically your last. We game, Loki. _She_ does not."

Loki leaned back on his mushroom stool, taking that in. "I'll go to Aelsa, and I'll tell her the truth as we spoke it. It seems… I have more than enough to resolve this. Is there any message you'd like me to pass?"

"Tell her I will attend her winter court after all. She'll know what that means." Titania rose, tall and slowly shifting back to her unearthly, true form. "Like as not, you'll wind up with an invitation as well after all this. It's worth accepting, but don't drink a single drop while you're there."

"Er…"

"I jest, we don't do that to guests." The smooth oval bark of her face split in a wide and worldly grin. "Often."


	17. Chapter 17

17.

. . .

Lady Adenium met Loki at the entry to the upper court, and he didn't remark on her bemused expression or the fact that she smelled, faintly and absurdly, of greasy pepperoni and cheese, but he did spend the short march the rest of the way upstairs wondering what the hell had gone on in the palace while he'd been running around on his spy games. In return, she didn't remark on the small lockbox under his arm or why, for his arranged meeting, he'd come from a different upstairs wing and not through the grand gateway to the palace.

He forgot about his questions when the guards announced them and let them by, and he saw Imda first, interestingly, seated comfortably on a broad bench, and next Queen Aelsa, smiling beatifically with her hands clasped together, and finally the stout, white-barked and black-fleshed tree rooted in the center of the throne room that certainly hadn't been there the last time Loki was in attendance.

The tree shivered and shifted and Loki, a fast adapter, recognized immediately that this unearthly figure was King Oberon himself. The 'tree's' roots dug in close to the thick trunk, and the branches wound close around itself. He was small enough to be damn near a bush, and Loki took a guess that was because this was what passed for kneeling low in obeisance, for a fae.

As Loki came closer to the small court, he found he was half right. Like Titania, Oberon shifted when the king saw Loki, but this ancient fae's more human form was just as small and stout as his tree-shape, and his white-black slashed tunic was cut to show he only bent on one knee that had reshaped itself from the roots, not fully knelt. Oberon's humanoid face still seemed elk-like and elongated, with two crowning, white bone horns protruding from his brow, and his eyes were dark brown and full of mixed emotions. They never quite met Loki's.

Oberon had to have been half his wife's size, which, to Loki, called into vague question why she had never drop-kicked him over the moon for his nonsense.

"Oh good, you're right on time!" Aelsa's words came with a birdlike and merry chirping, and Loki realized with a chill at her choice of words that everything Titania had said was true. He'd seen something clever hiding in Aelsa at his earlier attendance, but even he hadn't seen it all. She patted at a second bench near Imda, a naturally smaller one. "Prince Loki, do come over and sit by me and tell me _everything_!"

Within boredom's reason, he did. Oberon moved during none of it, his head bowed before the Queen of Alfheim. A barely visible moue crossed his face at the mention of Mooar, a flicker of what seemed to be regret or sorrow, and Loki was careful about his references to Ayelah and his own ire at the library. The final proof to his story was granted with a theatrical flourish. The gem produced from Leamhan's lockbox gleamed brightly when Loki showed how the illusion worked. Once he knew to look for it, the trick was simple. In his palm, the marque shifted from simple watchman's gem to Oberonese sigil like sunlight over the water. A glamour so simple, so smooth, even he'd missed it at first.

Aelsa smiled brightly at him through the tale and she took the box from him to place it on her lap. Her hands rested atop it, pale and tight and utterly at odds with her face. "How excellent is your work, good prince! I'll have Adenium question your witnesses on the record, keep it all nicely above board so no one can say I've played favorites. I'm terribly grateful that you've brought us such trustworthy names to vouch for your brother's intent. A _shame_ about the Archive's role in this, however. An absolute shame. I expect better from them, but, well, there's little I can do. They're quite entrenched in their ways, and quite beloved of my court."

That smile now seemed to have a great many teeth in it, even as the delight and cheer at Loki's presence seemed true. She liked him, plainly, and with a tiny bead of sweat at the back of his neck to underline what he felt, he understood this was a much better place to be than otherwise.

He also got the hint not very subtly buried in her words. He'd committed himself, wittingly or no, to a future of causing trouble at the Archive on behalf of the Queen. A role in which she would remain forever cloaked by plausible deniability - not unlike a better version of Titania's own game, it occurred to him. He caught a look from Ambassador Imda, amused and not quite pitying. _What a curse_ , said that look. _Poor you, with that reputation and that name_.

It was a fair point. It was realizing that he was now formally cornered into it that grated a bit.

Aelsa's smile never wavered. If this wee scrap of an Elf could trash Titania with a word, then perhaps, as Daisy liked to say, he should just suck it up. Maybe he would eventually even get over his pique and enjoy it. After all, everything he'd said to Ayelah was still the truth. And Milkmane… oh, he _did_ have it coming. It would be a game all its own to discover the ways a man like that was scraping cream off the business of books.

Someone still had to eat that box of receipts, after all. Loki found his mood perking up again, if slightly.

"It's honestly terrible that all of this got so far. Just terrible, isn't it, Obie?" That bright and shimmering face turned towards the kneeling king. "My goodness, that poor little Mooar, and everything that my _former_ watchman got up to on your wife's behalf, and my other princely guest, and-"

"Your Majesty," said Oberon, and it sounded desperate. Desperate enough to, like Loki had, risk interrupting Aelsa. It felt like every single one of Loki's internal organs winced, but his face stayed still. Oberon's voice was deep and sonorous, but also wobbling with emotion. "Your Majesty, I'm terribly sorry this all comes about under the veil of my own house. I'm sorry for whatever I did to my wi-"

"You know _exactly_ what you did." Aelsa's voice was frozen steel, seeming to come from an entirely different idea of her. Adenium went dead white behind her Queen. Seeing that, Loki didn't so much as blink as he shared another glance with Imda. Her face was just as tight, proving to him that, yes, this was indeed a frighteningly rare sight. "You may not understand, not yet, but you know well the roots of why Titania permitted this ruse against you. And that, good king Oberon, will be your charge. You will _learn_ to understand. You will go to your Queen and-"

"I'll talk to her, I promise, I-"

That was a mistake.

Oberon lapsed into immediate silence, gaping in new terror at the charge in the air. Aelsa seemed to swell in size where she now stood before him, her magical aura sparking into wilding life. She might be unwinged, far more Elf than Fae, but those small horns on her brow suddenly grew with brutal power, raw and gleaming blue with her fury, and making her just as inhuman as her stranger Fae charges.

Oberon shrunk as she stepped closer to him, and her fingers cupped around his chin, dragging the ancient king's face up to hers, and she _roared_ into his face. Loki winced, realizing her roar carried through the aether currents, making her words into the Word, a near-impossible state of pure archmagery that could not be denied without suffering. "You will _listen_ , you piss-droplet fool, you will _crawl_ to your wife before her oathed in her court at the hour she chooses to permit you, and you will kneel there and listen as she tells you for the _final_ time what you did and why it matters, and you will _abase_ yourself to her and then go away - go away, little Oberon, into the dark woods, with nothing but what I permit you to carry - for a decade to think upon what you have been told! Afterward, should I deem that you have indeed listened and begun to understand, I will have no more of your japery or hers taint my court or my guests for a thousand years! Should she act again, I will hold _you_ responsible anew!"

"Your Majesty." Oberon shook, the willow at the storm's mercy, and Loki smelled from him a scent like burning leaves.

"The glashtyn Mooar will come to me and speak witness, as I command. And when he does, _I_ will tell him that he will hold your goods and writs in a freeze until your exile is complete. For that service, he will be financed and protected by my word, as he is innocent here." Aelsa shot a glance at Loki, and though none of her ire was aimed at him, he still blinked at its heat. "He has acted honorably enough, I think, to be rewarded."

"Majesty," said Loki. "I have only kind words to say about Mooar. He wished to help a man who might be in need of the work he knew how to do, nothing else."

" _Lord_ Mooar, now that I think of it. High time his family gained a proper head of house." Aelsa let go and turned away from Oberon, who now looked like he might vomit. "Do you begin to understand, Oberon, when doing nothing is worse than doing something? Do you understood what damage your roots can do, when they burrow themselves into soil unasked?"

He said nothing, but his head bowed lower to acknowledge her.

"You will think on this, too." Aelsa glanced at Adenium. "I'm done with the King. Will you bring my other guest when this one's led out?"

"I beg… one word." It came out weak, and Oberon didn't move. "Not for myself."

Aelsa didn't turn around, and her voice turned wry. "Be wiser than previous, old Obie, and speak."

The head lifted a scant inch, and those frightened eyes found Loki's. "I owe you a personal debt, Prince."

Loki arched an eyebrow, his question silent but obvious.

"It was not me that looked for treason, and it would have created a stain to my name and my house should that lie have stood. That… that the outcome is still justly harsh to me is not of your cause, and I still hold debt to you for the truth. For Mooar, and for my loyalty to - to my Queens." Oberon rose, and without waiting for a response, he followed Adenium with stiff legs and a bent spine.

Aelsa didn't move from where she stood and waited for her next guest. It was Imda that spoke in Loki's ear, soft and mild. "You mark that down, Prince. And you charge his debt when it's of most use to you. You earned that. Old fae fools."

. . .

Adenium led Thor into the Queen's audience, and his arms bore no chains. He seemed to have just finished chatting amiably with the little red fairy, bowing his head towards her so she didn't have to crane her neck too sharply. Loki set down the half-full glass of cold mead Imda had wordlessly shoved at him when Aelsa stepped away to secure the evidence Loki had given her, and he rose to greet his brother. "Thor."

"Loki." Thor grinned. "Three nights, barely, I think. You're always scarily efficient. The mess we were in, would have guessed it would take a week."

"Efficiency is a useful way to mask one's own impatience, I've found." Loki didn't show any of his relief on his face, but he reached out and patted Thor's shoulder in that particular dry way he had.

Thor turned away from him to bow deeply to Queen Aelsa, who now showed no trace of the strange and wild hostility Oberon had faced. She smiled just as brilliantly for him as she had for Loki. "Your Majesty, while I can't say I'm happy for the turn of events, you have my full gratitude for your hospitality. Courtesy, particularly, of your good Lady Adenium."

She seemed to gleam even brighter, delighted by this news. "Oh, you've made a _friend_ of my little grump!"

The grump, set at the corner of their little triangle, grumped harder with a scrunched-up face. She also still smelled of earthly pizza, and the grumping didn't look as severe or as honest as it had a few days prior when Adenium had managed to shout down Loki himself.

Thor had that effect on people.

It drove Loki mad, sometimes.

"Your brother has indeed been _terribly_ efficient, he's got this whole mess sorted out for us just the way I'd hoped." Queen Aelsa reached out and took one of Thor's hands in both of her small, delicate ones. Thor glanced at Loki over her head, saw the brief flicker of dourness on his face. The Queen didn't notice. "I'm _so_ sorry the matter entangled you in this way. I have already personally begun discussing the issue with its antagonists, as your good brother can tell you!" She let him go and swirled away again, a little girl at play. "And now - what _was_ it you were both here for, after all?"

"Madame - Your Majesty, we were seeking some clues to an old family mystery. Some personal riddle of mine." Thor shifted his weight and kept his head at a polite tilt.

"And did you find such clues?" This was said to Loki. "In amidst this nonsense, of course."

"Majesty, we found only more mysteries, I'm afraid." He stepped to Thor's side, seeing a chance and going for it. "While our trail at the city library came to an unfortunate dead end, I thought to look in the less important collections to see who might have come to celebrate the coming of a new Asgardian prince. Ask those who were in attendance a few questions and-"

"Oh! You mean the gathering Odin had almost a year before that little golden baby was born?" Aelsa clasped her hands together by her cheek and her eyes seemed to gleam at the memory. "Yes, of _course_! I was there, naturally, it was _quite_ the interesting collection! All Nine Realms and more!"

The universe in its magnificence had thrown him another fateful bone. Eager at seeing the finish line appear so neatly before him, Loki stepped forward towards the Queen in what was more a hungry lunge. "Was there anything odd that-"

"Oh, but I can't talk about it."

"What?" It came out dead, somehow unsurprised, and in two conjoined male voices.

"The old growler made us all promise not to say a _word_ about what happened at that moot. It was all kinds of fascinating, really, it's a shame about that. But he wanted to keep it in the family, of course. It's a _very_ Odin thing to do." Aelsa looked rueful.

Behind Loki, Imda shifted, as if suddenly uncomfortable. Loki turned to look at her, and he read this expression, too. It said, simply, _oh_. "…Laufey's representative would never have taken that vow seriously."

Loki blinked. Then he blinked some more, rapidly. Aelsa _had_ specifically said all Nine. "Would someone really have been in attendance? The hostilities were particularly strong in that century."

"It would have been regarded as intelligence gathering." A tiny corner of a smile appeared. "Further, his men may have been Asgard's enemies to the ends of their lives, but no one, not even those fatnecked fools, turn down free food and drink."

"And…" Loki surprised himself, unable to say the words as easily as he thought. He collected himself, then tried to pass it all off as some normal, overdramatic pause. "Would Queen Farbauti know that tale?"

"Almost assuredly." Imda looked at him, wry. "It would have been regarded as…" She left the sentence dangling for Loki to finish, amused by him somehow. He suddenly realized she _knew_ , and she was, apparently charmed by that knowledge.

"Intelligence gathering." He rocked back on his heels, considering. Considering that little wordless 'oh' and the ambassador's out of place appearance here now in the court. Considering Aelsa, who knew exactly what they needed to know, yet kept her vows to another royal.

But she'd placed Imda here for the finale. Ostensibly because of that vow of honor that had let him run free on Thor's behalf. But in truth?

Plausible deniability. Even against the king of all the Nine. Because Loki had done Aelsa a favor, perhaps, or a royal guest of hers had been denied full hospitality, or because the sun had dawned just right. Regardless, now she was repaying it. Her way.

Much to his chagrin, if he had to go toe to toe with the Queen of the Elves, Loki knew now for absolute fact that he was going to die like a bastard. There was always a bigger fish in the water, and Loki was smart enough to know when it was swimming close.

Aelsa leaned up and kissed Thor once, quickly, one each cheek, then did the same to Loki, who knew better than to look too startled at the overly familiar contact. "You're both free, and I think now you've got something to help you get closer to what you need. I expect you're both full up on our hospitality, and would like to get your feet under you again. I know how you young boys are. Off to Jotunheim, then, like good little investigators."

"Majesty," said Thor with a bow, and his face as he rose said he knew there had been a lot here he hadn't followed, but a glance to Loki said he'd ask - _later_.

"Oh, but do come back, good prince Loki, do!" Aelsa stepped away from him and squeezed Imda's shoulder, her words a deliberate echo. "You really _should_ see the winter court this century. It's just so lovely, and all my friends will be there this time!"

"Of course," said Loki, because at this point it was pretty much a command. Imda gave him a mild, sympathetic glance and a wry grin, and that was the pretty much the capper on what Loki thought of the whole thing as he led Thor out of the palace and towards the place where they could, finally, leave the land of the Elves.


	18. Chapter 18

18.

. . .

"All right, what'd I miss?" Thor shrugged his way under the thick cloak Loki summoned for him, glancing back at the stone marker that was the only sign the Bifrost had jolted through with iridescent force. The ice reclaimed its territory all too quickly, even on this sheltered outcropping marked and tended for all new diplomatic travels between the realms.

"Could ask you the same. How does a fae end up smelling like a New York pizza?"

"We were hungry and bored and Leamhan had bolted town because of whatever you did, so there was nothing else we could do. We bonded over cheap beer and one of those lying pizzas your friend Miss Daisy told us about."

"Lying pi- oh, _those_." Loki shook his head. He hadn't bothered with a cloak of his own this time. It was as cold as ever, but the evening sky was bright with stars and the wind wasn't biting. Comfortable, as far as Jotunheim's residents marked it. He had to privately admit, it wasn't bad out. "One of these mornings I'm going to go into the offices and find out they've all died from a strain of mutant botulism off one of those monstrosities. She did mention that place fails their health inspection at least twice a year, didn't she?"

"No, she didn't." Thor didn't sound particularly concerned by this.

"Didn't mention the time I had to pick up a night shift in Ops at the last minute because someone whom I should politely lie about and say was not named Daisy but absolutely was named Daisy was locked in her bathroom after eating a calzone?"

"Never came up, brother."

"Yeah. Well. Hopefully you haven't killed your new fae friend."

"I think she'll be fine. She's made of sterner stuff than she looks. Has a mouth on her like a Kree dockworker when no one else is listening." Thor rubbed his hands together and squinted up at the ice spires in the distance. "Am I out of line to say that the Queen of Alfheim seems… particular?"

"Thor. You have _no_ idea." Loki took a step forward onto the snow, hearing a satisfying little soft crunch under his boot. Nostalgia hit him, childhoods at play among the drifts of the rare Asgardian winter. He never did think about how much he'd liked them then. Suppose it made sense, really. "You missed a lot. But it'll take a long telling, so let's just leave it with this: You're in the clear, I'm not in any trouble I can't handle, and whatever the hell you do in life, _don't_ get on that woman's wrong side. She's a Queen for good reason, and still a Queen for better."

"From you, that's a pointed warning. Anyway, yes, I suppose I can leave it there for now. I'll ask again some other time. Over good pizza, maybe."

Loki could hear the cheeky grin in Thor's voice, and flapped a rude gesture over his shoulder at him.

Just like old times. The better ones, even. Loki stepped away and forward, ready to get on with the business of finding out at last what nonsense Odin had thrown them all into before either of them were even born, and stopped when Thor's hand reached out and gently grabbed his upper arm. He turned to look at his brother, one eyebrow sharply arched. "What?"

Thor peered at him, at at first he looked like he didn't know what to say. Then he grimaced, in a particular way that meant he wasn't trying to upset someone, but felt the need to speak. "I can't say what it means that you came back to help, brother. That you made the choice you did."

"Yeah, don't worry about it." Loki tried to turn away, not wanting to deal with it right now. He was tired. His mind swirled from essentially having both won and lost in his duels with the Queens. The hand was still on his arm.

"Listen to me." There was a moment of paradoxical quiet before Thor continued. "It doesn't matter what Odin's got to say. It doesn't matter who gave birth to who. We're going to find out, because we deserve to, but it doesn't change the important part, Loki. We're a family. We have always been a family, because we-"

"I know." It came out shortly, bitter in a way that wasn't true, it was because the knowledge hurt to share. He tried to say it again, softer. "I know that, Thor. Always did. Why do you think I came back?"

The hand fell away, hearing the rest of the meaning there. "You're my brother."

Loki shook his head. "Honestly, if we're going to get all soppy about this right now, I'm going to stab you on principle. You know I will."

"Gods, you're still so damned defensive." It got Thor a look, squinting and narrowed. He grinned at Loki, then turned a little to scan their surroundings. The bluing ice, the buried stones. The horizon was clear and pretty, black and iced and full of those glinting stars, all of them unlike the ones seen from Asgard. "This is where it all began, in a way. Isn't it?"

Loki took a breath and he didn't say what he could have said. Being him, he spoke around it. "Every story has to begin somewhere, Thor. But where it starts for me isn't the same as where it starts for you. Or anyone else, really. That's the point of stories. One of them, anyway. Building a perspective, showing something someone else might not have ever seen. I'm going to have a different view than you. Sometimes that's painful. Sometimes it's even necessary."

"Is it painful for you here?" It wasn't prying at the center of his words. Thor sounded like he genuinely wanted to know.

"Not anymore," said Loki, and that was, oddly enough, the truth. "I do think it's strange, though, that to get to the root of this mystery of yours, we're drawn back to this old one of mine. It feels deliberate, and I've got some reasons to think on that." He did, too. They were vague and threaded thin, but much of it came back to Imda, and also Queens that knew far more than they let on. He reached back and knuckled at Thor's arm, not grabbing. "Come on. Let's get this done."

. . .

It was Loki's turn to stop suddenly, as they approached the massive arch at the mouth of the jotun fortress. "I would ask if you sense that, but you probably don't." He looked at the ground, feeling both the rhythm through his feet and the tiniest hairs raising on his neck.

"I do, actually. Like a drumbeat. That's not bad, is it?"

"Well, shit. I thought I was being oversensitive." Loki looked up, first at his brother's quizzical look, then at the palace, considering. "It's strange, is what it is. That's magic, Thor. That's an awful lot of magic - a Great Work in progress."

"Like one of the orreries I've seen?"

"Sort of, yes. I can't…" Loki trailed off, _feeling_ the magic tingle over his skin as he took another step closer to Queen Farbauti's sanctuary. "It's intricate. I don't dare try to touch it to figure out what it is, not for certain. But someone's creating something incredibly powerful nearby. The sort of creation that takes weeks, maybe even months to complete." He frowned. "I don't sense danger, Thor. There's a certain sublevel to the aura of weaponized magic that I'm not feeling. This has a harder pattern, like shielding or repair. At a guess I'd say it's a binding, there's… I don't know how to explain. I could show you the glyphs it reminds me of, but it'd mean nothing to you. A paradoxical feeling to it, like ribbons in the air. A net cast into an ocean."

"The giants are building something, then?"

"If it isn't them, I can't imagine they wouldn't know about it. The shaman kin hold majority sway now due to Farbauti's crown. It might in fact be something they're making, but again, it's not hostile." Loki called an old meditator's trick into his mind, preparing to dull his magical senses slightly before he got a headache from the sheer intensity of the work. Just as he finished charging a silent word, he sensed the approach of one of those shaman. A familiar one. "It's odd, Thor. It's not necessarily bad, but it's very odd. We're going to be greeted at the gate. You remember him. It's fine."

. . .

Gymir smiled broadly at the sight of the brothers, azure lips on a face almost as darkly blue, and his crown of small horns peeked out from under the loose woolen cowl he wore. The mute old shaman dipped his head in a greeting, a tattooed hand waving away the gate guards as he approached. He was still massive, towering over the two, but without that passive sense of menace that other giants in his size range often gave off. It was hard not to grin back.

"Gymir." Loki bowed his head back, and yes, he did smile for the grand elder giant. "We were suggested to visit by one of the Queen's ambassadors, regarding a family matter. Is Her Majesty available, by chance?"

Gymir peered at him, and that eye, almost the size and color of a good ripe apple, gleamed with dry humor. He gestured at Loki, beckoning for his smaller hand, and when Loki gave it over, familiar with the way he did sometimes communicate, Gymir held it gently in one of his huge own and tapped at it with another finger. The rhythms were musical, a kind of ancient stacatto language. Loki had taken the time to research it because he liked this shaman a great deal, and surprised the giant not all that long ago with having picked it up so quickly.

 _Surprised you do not ask the obvious, little kin._

"I was brought up to be polite. Whatever's in progress, it's not hostile and it doesn't seem to violate any treaties. I'm curious, absolutely, but, you know, rules."

 _Rules in eight realms or more are, to you, flexible, but here we get the very abiding young prince._ Gymir winked at him. _Now I know you better than that._

Loki rolled his eyes. "All right. I'm actually dying of curiosity, particularly since everyone's been quite good about communicating major moves between realms and a Great Work qualifies as something that would at _least_ get a note in a procedural briefing." Which he had access to, and sometimes even offered input on. He was guessing at a future where a formal ambassador between the two realms would be something valuable to have, and it wouldn't be a boring fate for a once-hungry prince that had learned to set his expectations to 'reasonable but still anarchistically fun.' "So either something was hidden, which I don't call likely, or there's something a _little_ weird about us showing up so soon after one of her ambassadors was in a position to realize she could drop a brightly lit sign reading _Go Here Now_."

 _Now that's much better._ Gymir chuckled, soundless even as his aura and his belly both rumbled gently. _Kinqueen Farbauti is not within the palace. Do you feel the center of the working?_

"It's not far, but to be honest, if I try to focus too hard it's going to give me a whacker of a headache. The Glaze?" The Glaze was a permafrost field just beyond the palace. It appeared to have been made by a meteor long ago, a shallow impact crater that filled with ice and became a smooth bowl crowned by stalactites reaching towards the sky. A good place for magic to collect. In old days, seers used the ice to create sprawling patterns to connect their prophecies and match them with the stars.

Gymir nodded, another grin tugging at the corner of his mouth. _She knows you're coming._

"Of _course_ she does. What's one more Queen tugging me around on her terms this week?" He felt Thor glance at him at that and once again sensed bad pizza and even more unwanted talking in his very near future.

 _I feel the breath of a good story, but one not ready to tell. I would be happy to walk with you and your windkin_ \- Loki knew the jotun had a concept for adopted siblings, and that was as close as they could translate it - _to announce you to her, and we can talk about the old ley under the palace on the way. You asked about that last time we met._

Loki quickly muttered what had been said to Thor _,_ looking for his nod. Thor grinned. "We'd like that, Gymir. Thank you."

. . .

Once upon a time, it was a rare thing for visitors to enjoy a pleasant walk on the permafrosts and glaciers of Jotunheim, and it was rarer still to look at the sky and not feel that the world itself is hostile to all that live. Yet under the new Queen even the eternal snows felt a little softer, as if the world itself knew the old wolf was dead and there was no longer cause to be as mindlessly cruel as he had been.

Gymir listened as the brothers talked to him about various things, Thor shoving in to tell at least one embarrassing tale about young princes wreaking havoc and getting threatened with another stabbing for his trouble. That got a laugh from Gymir, the huge head thrown back in delight and his belly quivering happily, and he told them about how young jotun dared each other to go into the oldest caves, which had been given over to the semi-sentient argiope, and not come back until they recovered a bundle of precious silk.

"I would pee myself," said Thor to that story, without an ounce of shame. It was obvious he was still thinking of the orb-weaver back at the village inn.

 _Most of them do,_ said Gymir through Loki, and once again it was known that many people of many realms could bond together over the universal fear of spiders. _The smart ones eventually realize they can stand at the mouth of their caves and ask politely. It works, usually a good spindle's worth gets tossed their way and all go away happy. The argiope don't like fear but they understand, in their fashion. They are peaceful and they keep the caves safe from the things deeper down. It's a silly dare, but it teaches a wise thing. It is better to ask than to take._

 _Naturally, Laufey killed a great many of them during his reign. It is a fine thing that he is gone. The argiope have been coming back to the caves recently, and they are forgiving._ Gymir paused by a stalactite twice as tall as he, and the starlight gleamed off a field ahead of him. Even through his dulled senses, Loki could feel the central mark of the Work, a singular rod of power thrust into the ice. _Ah, we are here._

Gymir lifted his head and he smiled, and he waved the brothers by. From here, they would meet the Queen without him.

. . .

Queen Farbauti didn't rise when Loki and Thor passed into the vastness of the Glaze and took in the scene. She sat on an artificial rise of ice and snow, her black skirts bunched comfortably around her and her bare blue hands clasped together at her knees, and she tilted her head politely with a sardonic grin as they first looked at her - and then looked at Odin himself, at the center of a bizarrely complicated set of etched runes, with Gungnir thrust into the ice at his feet.

Odin suspended the work with a mutter and immediately the pressure against Loki's head eased. He looked at them, his posture as stiff as his jaw under the beard, and his lone eye met theirs in turn, dull and aghast and completely surprised by this turn of events.

Farbauti shifted, drawing attention back to her, and she tossed a glance over to Odin, her expression now somehow even more dry and amused. "I _did_ warn you, old king. Thrice over. I told you outright that I would not be complicit."


	19. Chapter 19

19.

. . .

Queen Farbauti adjusted a stray fold of her dress, not interested in the old king's stricken look. "I'm simply not going to be bound up in your nonsense. You've tried this trick on your family too many times, and here you are, about to pay for it at last. Yes, partially of my doing. Should have thought of that before you asked for my assistance." She glanced up at Thor and Loki. "So. I had a few nudges arranged to get you lot to wander back either homeward, where sooner or later you would get someone to give up where the old bastard got off to, or be in a position to have one of my assistants use a few potential bits of information to have you come this way. Which, or who, was it?"

"Ambassador Imda," said Loki. He'd gone temporarily numb from brain to bone.

" _Alfheim_ , how by a frozen tuttle's tits did you end up in Alfheim?" Farbauti grimaced and then immediately waved it off. "No, don't tell me, you'll try and a minute in I'll ask if Aelsa is still a manipulative but good-natured psychopath and give up on the whole thing. Poor Imda. She's a hard-skinned dear, she can take that lot. _I_ can't."

Loki didn't say anything to that. Instead he kept standing there on the ice, wavering slightly, wondering if life was ever going to make sense again, and remembering that it hadn't in a decade so why would it start now?

"Alfheim. Oh, gods. The libraries, wasn't it? Had something you two thought might be useful. Even worse. They had a perfectly good system long ago, now look at it. Infested with _bureaucracy_." Farbauti sniffed. "All right, enough whinging from me. Have at the old man. He's defenseless and surrounded by frost giants. A thousand years ago my useless mate would have danced naked in an icestorm for this chance."

"Your Majesty!" Odin snapped it at her, still more startled than furious.

"You're absolutely right, a naked Laufey _is_ a disgusting mental visual. I'm off dessert. Tell you boys what, we'll throw him in with the wolf pups. They won't eat him. The tickling of their tongues will drive a man mad in an hour, though. It's better than torture."

"Farbauti!" Louder. Now a little angry.

"There, that's better. He gets all stodgy and tries to use the _rules_ for his foolishness. Of course you two know that better than I." Farbauti still didn't bother to look at him. "Poke him a little bit till he gets angry, there's the vulnerability. If you can withstand the bluster. So ordinary, really."

"Okay." Loki broke in with a hand up, trying to ignore the headache freshly growing behind his eyes. Whatever he had expected coming to Jotunheim, it hadn't been watching _this_ strange verbal throwdown between royals. "Right. I got the part where you arranged to have us show up here in time for… whatever this is."

"You had plenty of time. He's only been at this for a week or so, got good use out of one of his sons haring off angrily. He's not as good at magic as he could be, though he's not bad. He's got what he learned from Frigga and he's got my help and-"

"And you've been foot-dragging." Odin shifted on the ice, Gungnir staying firm as he let go of it. "Haven't you?"

Now she looked at him, seeing the stocky old man with his hands on his hips, and she wasn't impressed. "I have _not_. One thing I won't do is sully the art, you brute. It's a Great Work we're re-imagining all over again, and I'm nursemaiding you through it. It was going to take till High Feast as it is, and now it's going to take eternity unless you tell your beleaguered family what you're up to and _why_."

"As you've apparently decreed to the King of the Nine Realms."

Farbauti got up, towering over Odin, _looming_ , in fact, very specifically, and while she remained serene and amused, there was a steel glint in her eye. " _You_ brought me into this scenario, old one, when you took blood for your own with a thought to the future of the realms. You bring me into it again when you ask for my help with a work that is beyond your hands. Now, I don't much care for families that manipulate each other with silence or violence when a clear word would be better help. I've lived that, Odin All-Father, and I've been in a cell for it, and I'm not going to take it from _you_ or anyone else, ever again. You wanted a better future for your throne? Well, I will _drag_ you into it when you don't realize you yet balk at the hard parts. For that future's sake."

Odin blinked.

"I really did like your wife better. You're not bad, exactly, but _gods_ , you're a stubborn one to deal with. She would at least pause and consider. Families. Gods bother." Farbauti snapped a hand at him with a sigh and then sat back down again. "I've got him doubly cornered, get to it before he struggles loose again."

Thor stepped forward, his foot crunching softly on a layer of ice. His voice was just as quiet, and he didn't sound angry. Disappointed, perhaps, and a little sad. "What wouldn't you tell me about my birth when I asked? What are you hiding?"

Odin looked away.

"You didn't update the royal genealogies at all, did you?" Loki chimed in with the conclusion he'd been sitting on since talking to Ayelah. "After your marriage, you simply… let them sit. The one in Alfheim for certain, but even if I had arranged a way to get to the palace original, we'd have found the same, wouldn't we?"

"Yes," said Odin, defeated. "Yes, Loki, I sent away the chroniclers with a promise to write the words in a time when we could look back on those days and find them better." He looked up, saw Thor looking back at him. "I answer the easier question first. I suppose you want an apology for that."

"I just want the truth. _Father_."

"I need to sit. The work is difficult, and the pace is… well." Odin sighed, then realized another pile of snow was forming itself at the lip of their space. Farbauti's hand wavered gently at her side, and from somewhere, a soft red cushion appeared atop that new seat. "I hadn't meant to ask, but thank you."

"You're welcome," said Farbauti, quiet and kindly now.

Odin went and settled himself, and the copper robe he wore bunched around him. He looked old and weary, and Loki remembered how easily he had fallen into the Sleep before, and how there had been a chance, even then, that he wouldn't come back. Grief weighed Odin down now, and his old secrets were coming back to roost, and Loki realized that whatever was happening in Jotunheim was part of preparing for something else. Something far more final. He glanced at Thor's face, and saw that his brother knew the same.

"The tales you two know about your childhood are true. But there are pieces missing," said Odin at last. "Stories that start in different places, and different times. I suppose… well." He sighed, a heavy one, and his lone eye roamed the ice at his feet. "You should know, Thor, that you are not my firstborn son."

Thor didn't move, and he didn't look surprised. He only waited, with weary eyes watching his father.

"Frigga bore a child shortly after our marriage, yes. There were conflicts abound, issues from Bor's passing that took public attention and so we decided there would be time before we announced a prince. Wait for a moment when the realm would be glad for glad news. It was a bitter gift, as it happens, that we waited.

"His name was Baldur, my first son. He was a small baby, and he'd come early. Eir and Frigga were not worried about this, and they tended to him day and night, and taught me how to hold him gently. I remem…." Odin trailed off, and by the movement of his throat it was obvious it was hard for him to speak. "I remember looking at him in his cradle once, and he looked up at me, and there seemed like there was nothing but light in his eyes. I had such hopes for him."

Neither brother said anything.

"There was a morning where he didn't wake up. I have no drama for you, my sons. There is no dark secret here. No underlying tragedy. Only grief. I heard… I heard my Frigga make a noise I never wanted to hear again. The sundering of her heart.

"It is a thing that happens, sometimes. Even to ours, in Asgard. To kings and queens. It simply… happens." Odin shifted on his cushion, and the ice stared dumbly back at him. "We didn't write it down in the chronicles. We couldn't bear to. I haven't looked back to them in a long time."

"Father…" Gentler now.

Odin put up a hand to stop Thor. "Frigga wanted to try again. Her family had been a large one. She wanted the same. A few years later, we were… the news came from Eir that she would give birth in the winter. A hard birth, this time. The healers suggested it might be from the anxiety, from the fear and loss we felt over Baldur. But our daughter came one night, a cold night with bright stars. I remember that so clear. She was a quiet baby, and she seemed to see everything from her first moment. They say babies are born blind, but to my end, I will say she was not."

Loki mouthed his question instead of screaming it, the simple 'what' shaped by a gawping oval, this second secret so fast after the first. _Daughter_? _And what more? How much is hidden_? But he said none of this, frozen, waiting, feeling like he was trapped elsewhere entirely.

"We named her Hela, to honor the secret of Baldur's loss. To remember the dead." Odin paused. "Eir told Frigga, and Frigga later told me, that Hela would be the last child she could have. Because of that… difficulty. Our healers are powerful ones. There are certain things that are still difficult to do safely."

Odin glanced at Gungnir, still driven into the ice at the center of the runic circle. "Hela was everything an Asgardian could be. She was powerful, driven, intelligent. By the time she left childhood she was touring with our outriders, looking for jotun and kronan warbands to slay. There was never any question of letting her take the warrior ways, she boldly presented herself to weaponsmasters and swordkin alike. She was… well. We were at wars, many of them, and she, young but intent, was at my side from the moment she could keep up."

Farbauti didn't stir where she sat, but she glanced at the brothers, and her eyes were half-lidded in thought.

"We have buried time, my sons. I buried the knowledge of her. Just a couple of centuries worth of life, but they are black enough."

"If she was so grand then-"

"You know part of this," said Loki, and his voice was cold. "We were raised with the story. Just… from another point of view. That different perspective."

Thor looked at him. "I don't understand."

"The dark forests beyond the palace. Where the veil between realms could be thin. I was nearly killed there once, remember? By things from Hel. By-"

"Oh gods." Thor wavered as he remembered. Children at play, running away from their rooms at night to pretend they were at war. He'd only known a little of the story. Loki had gone out alone one night to prove he wasn't afraid of his nightmares, or the rumors of ghosts in the woods. But it had been a mistake, and some awful power had nearly strangled the young prince to death. Thor knew, but he hadn't felt that clawing power around his throat the way Loki had. "Oh gods, Loki, oh _gods_."

"Frigga stopped her. But she spoke to me, Hela. And she hated. She seemed made of it. We've known her as the ghost queen of the dead all our lives. An old myth given a name but stripped of her real lineage." Loki bit his lip hard but didn't feel it. "The forest. That's where you bound her away the first time, why it was always meant to be off limits to us as children. That's what you're doing now, remaking that seal. She's alive. _Why_? _What did you do?_ " His voice cracked, slightly.

"Hela… Hela was born with great power, and even greater ambition." Odin never looked at them. "As time went on, I wanted the wars to fade. I already grew weary of them. I had fought since I was a child, and my thoughts had begun, at last, to turn to peace. Hela… she was young, but she wanted more of what she had tasted. She styled herself as a part of Death Herself, and felt fated to it, for she warred so well for Asgard. There are realms now that are still cowed, that bid to us, because the fear of her - and me - is burned deep into their soil. And I… I do regret that, now. But the past cannot be changed. Hela would not change."

"So you sealed her away?" Thor roared the question.

"I…" Odin's voice began to creak.

. . .

Frigga dipped the cloth into a bowl of herbed water, a quick poultice as the halls of healing were on the other side of the rampaging princess. She dabbed it at the side of Odin's face, and her eyes were damp. "She'll never stop. She knows better than we do what our realm is built on, and she has dedicated herself to feeding it."

"It's my mistake. It's a mistake built on my blood." Odin coughed and it rattled in his chest. The attack wasn't unexpected, but it still hurt where the armor dented against his ribs.

"She doesn't see it that way. No mistakes for our Hela." Frigga dipped the cloth again, shaking her head. "Is she even wrong? Conquest is what we are. What we've made."

"I don't want it to be what Asgard always is, Frigga. You taught me that peace has value. That it can create new growth. Conquest - we'll stagnate in time. We'll _end_. We'll talk to her again, this rebellion will stop. We'll talk-"

Frigga looked troubled enough that Odin interrupted himself. She reached up and stroked his face. "She killed her own guards to make them her immortal dead. To stand them by her day and night, their loyalties chained forever. I love her, Odin. She is my daughter, my only child, and she no longer listens to me." Frigga took a breath. "Gods, I wish it were that to speak solved all things, but it does not. She killed her _guards_ , even sweet old Jhor who used to stand by her crib, and she thinks that made them better warriors. I've seen what she's made of them, with those horrifying eyes. Odin, I don't know what she's become."

"She's a Queen born to a kingdom." Odin shifted where he lay. "Like the ancient story of the goddess of the damned. Perhaps Ragnarok is true. Perhaps we come to the beginning of the end and she is, truly a handmaiden of Death."

Frigga's face crumpled. "How did we do this? What did I do _wrong_?"

Odin clutched at her, pulled her to his chest and held her as she sobbed. "Hela believes we did nothing wrong, love. She is full of the rightness of her work - and it is a work that I did my part in teaching her. I believe you did nothing but love your child."

Frigga continued to cry. In the distance, a wolf howled, hungry and full of deadlight power. Hela had brought the pup back from one of the raids against Jotunheim years ago. It had been a charming touch for the cold girl… until the giant wolf began to change into something far more feral under her care.

Now Fenris hungered all the time, and his fur was like steel bristles. Men bled when they approached him, and yet he was one of the few things that still made Hela smile. Her smiles were terrifying.

"This isn't her usual lashing out, Odin. She meant that blow to kill you."

"I know."

"I called the Valkyries. They're gathering on the shore, and Heimdall has hidden them from all sight."

Odin shook his head, hurt to the bone by the knowledge that Frigga, again, had out-thought him. "What do you mean to do?"

"I mean you to go to them, husband, to lead them. She has to be stopped. She…" Frigga trailed off. "If we give her the throne of Asgard, we make this realm a new Hel itself. Her power will grow rich on blood. I can't let that happen." She pulled away from his chest, cupping his face again with her hands. "It has to be stopped."

"With a charge by that ancient force."

"She's never faced them. There's a reason they're one of the last lines, why we hide them until we've no choice." Frigga inhaled. "Gods grant me forgiveness. If we can bear it, Odin, we kill her."

"No!" It came out in a roar, and Frigga seemed to shrink inward. "Bitter and full of war, but she's all we have! Given time-"

"Given time she'll grow stronger yet. We'll never stop her then." She looked away, taut and pale. "There is… one other option I've had to consider." Then back to him, and her eyes were dark and full of pain. "But it may in time cost even more than the hurt of such a loss. Whatever we do, we _have_ to hurry."

. . .

"At her suggestion, we sent the Valkyries to distract her, to wound her. And Frigga, my poor Frigga, arranged this other plan. A dangerous work, done quickly. Too quickly. She used the Force that binds us to the throne. The same undercurrent of kingship that grants the gift of our magic sleep. It was the only thing she could reach that had that much lasting power - and so, our daughter is alive, and she is bound by my life force. My life is the chain that consigns her to rule in Hel and there alone." Odin was beyond exhausted, and his face was grey.

"The Great Work." Loki still felt numb.

Farbauti spoke up. "He wants to reshape it. The binding must remain, of course, but we can use Gungnir as its focal point instead of an aesir's life. Artifact work is more stable, if vastly harder to initially create. It's no wonder Frigga's solution was a risky one. Blood works fast. Now. The spear has always been a mark of office, but we're to make it more than a symbol. He wanted that, instead of making a horrorshow of the next king's ascension."

"Of course?" Thor threw her a sharp look. "We hold a royal prisoner!"

"Hela has been bound for centuries, and in that time she holds close her rage and her righteousness." Odin seemed to crumble under Thor's anger. "This is a burden of my make that cannot be repaired with her freedom and my apology. Loki, I feel your stare. You are a better man today because you believed, at last, in change - for yourself, for others, for situations that otherwise seemed bleak. Because you accepted that sometimes the things we do are not right and we should seek another way to live. Hela doesn't have that. She believes to her core that what she is is what she must be. She might never change."

Odin took a breath, the air around him showing no warmth. "I beg you, try to understand. Frigga felt first that our best chance was to end her only child. Understand this in the context of your own lives - Thor, that she cherished you so much that she would fight me to protect you. Loki, that she _never gave up on you_. Never. You have her gifts, and they grow beyond what she taught you. Even when it was darkest, she believed in your hope.

"But Hela. My sons, Hela is _my_ scar, and I do not want you to carry her when I am gone. I made her what she is. Let her be the queen of the damned - but if you cannot bear to let my rough justice hold, think long on your quest to redeem her. Perhaps you can. You are now both better men than I. But before you try - gods, I beg thee, think _hard_. If she is free with her power and her rage, I believe she will destroy Asgard and all the realms." Odin lifted his head and looked at them with the plea plain on his face. "Do not compound my mistakes. But please know that this is something more than you have faced. She was born in the shadow of a prince's death, and I think that changed her from the start."

"I can't… I can't believe this," said Thor, and the words sounded mushy against his lips. Shock marked his face.

"I remember the raids against this realm," said Farbauti. "I saw their results. I will give you no opinion of my own, but I offer a brief testimony, so that you might understand a little of why I agreed to the All-Father's request, even knowing the responsibility for these memories goes back to him. And why I felt you should know, despite him."

Loki looked at her, found she was looking back at him and not the other two, as if that were easier somehow. Farbauti was not one to show pain, but she looked muted now, and her voice was quiet. "Hela made no distinction between combatant and civilian within a realm that was at war with hers. The war marked all for death, and I know of a time when her warband made prisoners of a group of shaman. These shaman were forced to heal Laufey's warriors at his command, good men and women who chose to obey the old wolf rather than see their temple turned to ash and their families made hostages. I know that this did not matter to Hela. I know that she and her men killed most of those shaman when they would not tell her where other field healers were keeping the wounded, and the ones that lived were left so as a warning. They would not speak? She _marked_ them with that bravery, to shame them. One returned to the palace missing most of his lower jaw. Another's throat was mangled. We are hardy. One of my maidens passed out at the sight of his wound. Another… he lost his tongue, torn from him and fed to that demon wolf to mock his vows."

Loki jerked, realizing the unsaid.

"These shaman are still alive, and they mean a great deal to me. Their kindness saved their lives, strengthened them to withstand all for the chance of better days. I believe in this. I will fight with my own kin to honor that." Farbauti frowned. "I find I want to lie. I want to give you an opinion, and it is a dark one - but, well. I have also seen that change is possible. Nonetheless. I agreed to help, if by my terms, and I must concur with the All-Father's plea. Consider, before you act. Hela does not value such kindness as we have learned to."

Loki licked his lips and glanced aside to Thor, who seemed almost translucent. He looked done, as if he could take no more. And yet, there was still the question.

It occurred to Loki that he was taking this all rather well, in comparison, but then, he'd already faced his worst and come out the other side. Eventually. Loki spoke, because Thor was unable to. "If Frigga could bear no more children, then how is it we're both here?"

Odin grunted, tired but wry. "Because there is such kindness left in the universe."

Loki searched his bowed face, looking for a joke.

Odin lifted his head, showing his seriousness. "Several years after we sacrificed most of the Valkyrie to seal Hela away, I thought to hold a feast. To mark a change of season, to try and start building peace, even knowing that I would begin a hypocrite. I sent word to a certain few among the realms and among our merchant allies, to kings and queens and foreign gods - and so did Frigga. To friends, to kin. Not a grand gala, but a fine and subdued moot. To remember, to talk, to dine. We even invited Laufey, to try and ease a war that would not end for some time yet."

"He sent his fat old friend, Beli, in his stead. By _friend_ , I mean that if he'd been poisoned by the aesir, Laufey would have had a mean laugh over it." Farbauti snorted. "Beli liked to talk, incidentally. Even to caged queens. Especially if that queen offers him food."

Odin sighed. "Undone over and over by you, am I?"

"Mmhmm. Didn't think having _that_ bit of information I got from him was ever going to become relevant. I assume my Imda realized I held that, made it her goad. You look weary, old one. Do you want me to tell them?" She was teasing Odin, if gently.

He waggled a hand at her, then continued to speak.

. . .

There were no ribbons or draperies or an overabundance of gold. There was an older structure out behind the palace, a longhouse built out of ancient woods that predated any of Odin's kin, and he and Frigga decided to hold their moot there. Frigga's ivy gave it life and color, and Odin summoned the hunters and the farmers, and it was a fragment of a simpler time.

There weren't many invited, though they came from strange places. Queen Aelsa, eternally youthful and dangerous. The new King Eitri in stardust-glint armor, as grandly stout as befit the dwarven ancients. The hall filled quick. A Shi'ar merchant, the jotun man, Beli, a sour-faced and shivery fire elemental from Surtur's court that had no name, a lapis rainbow of a Kree priestess, Vanir family and friends, sorceresses, a couple old war gods from dead planets that the All-Father used to know, and, much to Odin's surprise, an ancient human woman in a stiff robe of brown moss. He had sent word to the last few roaming priests of Atlantis and looked for a few other advocates from Midgard, but it was Frigga that chose to offer hospitality to some strange deity of that young world.

This was Gaia, and she spoke little to the other guests. She liked to watch them with a smile on her wizened face, and she would not eat the meat. She drank the mead instead, like a bee at a rose's nectar, and her feet were bare on the grass. It was Frigga that introduced her, and Frigga who mostly stayed at her side, and spoke kindly to her as if she were much younger and needed guidance.

Odin passed close, gave her a look not long after the moot was in full swing. Midgard was their protectorate, but there was really little there yet, and its few gods were alien to him. Frigga looked back at him, steady, and grabbed his arm with her hand. "We were the young races once, Aesir and Vanir, and I think we would have been different if we began with kindness," she murmured into his ear. "I want something different for the humans. I want to see what they become."

He watched Gaia beyond, turn her head to stare at him as if she'd somehow heard, and her eyes were full black - and strangely warm. "Who is she?"

"Gaia is the secret heart of Midgard. A mirror of the planet's life. She is its gardener. Eir met her once long ago, seeking new flowers. I've sent a few messages since."

"And you think she is a better advocate to have here than that sorceress in the yellow robes?"

"That one's bound to strange gods that I don't understand yet, I don't like to interfere. And those norsemen that worship you are not ready for the sight of us like this." She let him go, and there was something tired and bitter in her voice. "I want something to hope for, Odin. You want peace - I want life to thrive. Is that so much?"

"Humans."

"They're still so _new_. They're struggling to their feet, like foals. Gaia thinks a small new renaissance will come in a few centuries, another burst of art as societies intersect. I want to see that." She studied his face and for a moment young Frigga returned, curious and alive despite her hurts. "In a thousand years, any miracle can happen."

"Or curse."

She frowned at him. "No pessimism. Not tonight. Just hope, my love. All right?"

All right. He found a smile inside of himself, gave it to her freely.

. . .

The last toast came after midnight, done in the old ways and the old tongue, Odin rattling a poem to the future, and to Frigga's hope, and that was to be the end of the moot. A pleasant moment in a pleasant space, and little more. The candles dimmed, Aelsa clapped for him, and it might have been done. The other guests laid their little gifts on the table. Icons, a bolt of fine cloth. Eitri left an ingot of starheart steel, and nodded his head in promise.

Gaia stepped forward without looking for attention, her hands empty. She moved onto the carpet that had been laid under the long table, and she smiled, and suddenly she looked youthful and bright. "I'm not much for things that we keep, I'm sorry. Good Queen, may I take your hand a moment?"

Frigga smiled and rose and went to her, ever the consummate hostess.

Gaia bowed to her, and took the hand, and then clutched Frigga tightly to her, and her face changed into something… else. Something living, and writhing, like roots scrambling in deep soil.

Odin scrambled out of his seat and charged towards the pair as the other guests gasped and turned at the sudden motion. By the time he'd moved three steps, Frigga was let go, her face bright red, and he was close enough to hear the goddess whisper. A quick chant, a speech, a spell, all in a split second, materializing in an instant. The strangeness of it, the way it teased through the ether and across his skin. He froze. This Gaia was indeed a Power.

 _You give kindness for the sake of hope, and you ask for nothing. I see your pain, Queen, and you do not ask for salve. You do not beg, you do not fight what you could not change. So I give it to you, because I can, because it is free and kindness should be. I give you life back, but once. Treasure it - and when kindness has need, you clutch it. I am not a seer, but I see shadows, and I see two small ones at your feet. I give you this one chance - but watch Fate. Fate may grant another._

 _Love, my friend Queen. Love, because when hate came, you chose to try again for hope._

Odin reached out for his wife, and the goddess was suddenly gone.

Frigga looked at him, stricken, but _alive_ , and her fingers tangled with his.

. . .

"I…" Thor trailed off, thinking.

"You are our son, and you are so because a goddess of Earth gave Frigga a gift beyond recompense. You were born almost a year later, and Eir hid her records because she was trying to understand how that strange magic had… influenced Frigga. It's never happened before, and there are certain politics to a royal birth. The idea that we had been bribed by Midgard, or changed by them, could be dangerous to you. It's a small thing, but small things have power. In truth, we _are_ your parents. I still don't understand why Gaia did it. I tell you her words, but I don't know all of the meaning within. I think, sometimes, she simply loved how Frigga was so curious about the realm under her care. I think she saw hope for her realm within ours. It's paid off, I suppose, tenfold or more. Whether it was her goal or not, you are as much Midgard's protector as ours. And Loki… you were also our son, because Frigga believed, to her very end, in kindness."

Thor lowered his head and nodded, and he looked satisfied. Troubled and still hurt, but the ground under him was firmer now.

Odin then lifted his head to speak to Farbauti. "Though I should, at last, apolog-"

"Don't." Farbauti was looking across the ice, not at him, not at anyone. Her voice was gruff, but it gave away nothing else. "Worked out all right."

"Your Maj-"

"Laufey was a shit entire. With the time you have left, old man, keep fighting to be better than he was." She got up and dusted the snow from her skirt. A moment later she squinted up at the sky and the stars darkening against a deeper black. "We've ice coming in and my kitchen's got a good, fat boar on. Let's get into my home and you can keep apologizing to these two. Figure you've got a few hours worth ahead."

"Farbauti."

She whirled on him, not unkindly, and with a distinct flair for the dramatic. "I'm not going to sit around here and listen to you lot get all emotional with each other when I can at least get wine inside. I did my part in getting you idiots to talk when you could have merely given up the truth a week ago, if not _ages_ , and now I'm done with it for the day. Spare me the intricacies of your melodrama, old king, if you would do _me_ any kindness."

Odin rolled his eye over to Loki, as if to say _if you didn't know you two were related, there's some hard proof._

Loki stared back, dry and sarcastic, and absolutely not taking sides on this one.

"I brought dwarven mead," said Odin instead, as a peace offering.

"Oh thank gods, he's useful for something," muttered Farbauti, still visibly annoyed. She flung her cloak over her shoulder, beckoning at them with snapping fingers. "Come on, you three. Eccentric family dinner at the frost giant homestead. It'll cheer you up, Prince Thor. You can listen to the new pups whine for scraps, the brats."

"How big are they when born?" Curiosity ate through the shocks.

"Come up to your hip, I'd say. I don't let them 'round the tables when they get much bigger, they'll snatch the whole damn meal when you glance off. But they're good company, they keep the hall warm for guests, and they don't talk politics. I'd say we're all done with that for now." Farbauti glanced back at the three men. "Or is there something else we've got to get off our chests?"

"I think I'm good, actually," said Thor.

"Right. You?" She jutted her chin towards Loki.

"I've been jerked around by three different Queens this week and I'm really very tired," Loki said with a small smile.

"Not my fault, _I_ didn't have the grand idea to go to bloody Alfheim." Farbauti sniffed. "Odin?"

He was quiet. Then he said, "I tried to repair my mistakes, and didn't realize for centuries that in so doing, I made countless more. I _am_ sorry. I did what I did because I believed I was right, and because I loved my family."

"You could try listening to it more," said Thor. "There were a lot of times when you could have."

"I know." Odin nodded. "I know, Thor. It doesn't change the past, but I know now."

"It's a start," said Loki, feeling the first patter of ice against his shoulders and smelling its crispness. He reached out to grab Odin's arm when he began to move with the group towards the palace, to support the tired old man. "It matters. Even this late, it matters."

Thor took his other arm, and they went on to a warm meal and good company. They knew that things were not healed, but at least now they had a chance to begin.


	20. Epilogue: Still Swimming

Epilogue: Still Swimming

. . .

There was a forest's edge in the lee of the snowy mountains of Alfheim, and it was often dark there, and its merchants and scholars kept it warm enough to be cozier than it looked. It was a good place for someone to work uninterrupted, and people minded their own business, which was typically running supplies and information to the icebound sorcerers up where the air grew thinner.

Leamhan had been there less than a week, and he'd finally started to relax again. He'd gotten a job with a messenger team that didn't ask questions, and they didn't bother him about seeming a bit older than their usual youthful applicants. His jovial mask was on straight, he made the right connections quickly, and he was already friends with the lead barkeep at the inn where he'd gotten a room. It would do for a while. Maybe in a few months he would even dare to send his Queen a letter. He would have to move on again after, of course, just to be safe.

He missed the smell of her perfume already. A touch, a smile, a whiff of her air. It was all he needed. For Leamhan, love was never about what was physical. Titania was something more, a bit of magic given life and shape, and he would have died for her if she asked. Aelsa always frightened him, but Titania was his gentle sun.

It made him rend himself with guilt that when he _had_ faced consequence, he'd fled as if on some animal instinct. If he were braver, he would have stayed and faced Prince Loki. But the broken blade…

He wept a lot, and he regretted. Thor hadn't seemed like a bad sort. Maybe he would have even understood the joke under it all, in time. But his own anger at Oberon had made a fool of them all, and given him an enemy in the other prince, whose distractions Leamhan had underestimated severely.

It was a cold night, and he came down from the mountain with a new tome of mossy runes to send on to a city he'd left behind, and Leamhan had his sup and slept as well and as deep as he could. Not very, to be truthful, but at least he usually felt rested enough to continue wearing his friendly face in the day to come.

The next morning brought a knock to his door, not unusual. The innkeepers passed job notifications, sometimes, and the rent would be due soon. Leamhan got up, his eyes still blurry, and opened the door a crack. "Mail," said the old fat goblin that ran the place, and he shoved a rolled letter into his hand before tottering off again.

Leamhan stared dumbly at the letter. There was no return marque, but the seal on it was a deep royal green.

 _Oh gods_.

It unrolled itself at the warmth of his hand, the tiny bit of magic pouring over his fingertips. He twitched, waiting for the poison to kick in, his breath shallow, his gaze unable to read the words for several minutes, the world gone narrow and hazy.

But time passed, and Leamhan kept breathing. He read the letter, his hands numb and shaking around the paper.

 _Watchman Leamhan. You'll forgive the magic, I felt it was likely you'd take one look at this letter and find the nearest bonfire, and that wouldn't help either of us._

 _It is now two weeks since I presented myself to Queen Titania, who was good enough to explain the entire foolish scenario to me. She spoke kindly of you though she admitted your actions, and a visit to Queen Aelsa shortly afterward cleared the entire matter up. I suppose we may be grateful that your plan came to such a neat, if unintended, finish. I credit this entirely to your queen's transparency._

 _I am not the best of men, Leamhan. You and I both know my reputation. You acted against me and my family knowing it. A bold move, and a stupid one. You knew that, too._

 _There have been times in my life where I would cherish my vendettas. I might have even yet felt callous joy, knowing you do not sleep well so long as you know that I am angry with you quite personally. I am still angry, Leamhan. But Titania cares about you, enough so that she asked - not demanded, but asked - for consideration. I have thought about this a great deal, and I am not the best of men, but I do consider change. And I have changed my mind. I have not forgiven you, not yet, but I am not going to hunt you._

 _Well. Beyond the scant little I did to have this note delivered._

 _You're not very good at this. I suppose it's for the best that you are being granted this moment of mercy. I do not want a thank you letter, and I absolutely don't want your groveling. I want your silence, unless and until you come up with something useful to say to me._

 _Go home, Leamhan. Your Queen already misses you, and the sorcerers up in the mountains think you're a tit. Go do what you're better at, and for gods' sakes, don't piss me off again._

 _My very best regards,_

 _Loki, Prince of the Nine, who is looking at you right now from the bakery across Shadowfalc Lane, having a good cup of coffee and an even better laugh at your expense._

Leamhan dropped the letter, whirled, and stared out his window.

Across the way, in the common room of an extremely upscale Elvish kitchen, a shadow hoisted a mug at him.

Leamhan passed clean out.

But a few minutes later, he woke up alive and more than ready to go home.

. . .

 _Days later_ ~

Loki felt the rush of the Bifrost disappearing behind him, leaving him to the mercy of a sudden blizzard, but he kept his eye on his phone despite all that. He was no longer central to the issue of the threats agains the UN council session, as he'd missed a fair amount while he was trying to resolve the latest family drama. It hadn't magically all ended here in Jotunheim. He ended up staying an extra few days in Asgard, mediating the familiar shoutfest that was the other part of sorting out the issues and the hurt around good old family secrecy. It meant, in its backwards way, that things were slowly getting better.

And at night, like old times, he and Thor talked. Mostly about the thing they hadn't wanted to at day, when they looked at Odin, and at Asgard, and at the past.

Odin was dying. He'd been fighting it for a long time, and he'd begun to let go after Frigga's death. They spoke in hushed tones about how he was still holding on, if a little, for their sakes. For the truths he'd been struggling to admit, for Thor's sake, still fond of being part of Midgard, for the chance to see Loki continue to change. To prepare Asgard and to keep it safe. They were not easy conversations, but they were necessary ones. It might not be this year, that final rest, but it was going to be soon, and no matter what, they weren't going to be ready.

But together, Loki supposed, they were going to try.

Meanwhile, Coulson and the team had figured out who was trying to pin Latveria as a terrorist influence against the now in-progress UN meeting. In the end, the mundane truths had come out - Lucia von Bardas, Doom's former attache, gave SHIELD a handful of trackcodes related to old technology that seeped out of the country, and those trackcodes had finally led, with a little old-fashioned spycraft and some dedicated internet scraping, to a Russian troll-factory with just enough deniability that now everyone in DC was fighting over whether or not to sanction the Russian government again.

On the whole, maybe it had been for the best that Loki had missed the culmination of the mess. He _had_ offered a few quick but not very politic solutions, anyway. Like the one that would involve a Dwarven flame-spigot and a particular horse-riding asshole strapped to a pile of his embezzled money.

He'd mentioned that idea to Coulson in front of Talbot. Talbot nearly threw up. Well, at least that part had been worth showing up for.

Loki put his phone away, content that things were finally moving smoothly for a change, and he smiled up at Gymir, who met him at the palace gate. Loki sent a request earlier in the day to visit, and had been surprised at how quickly permission had been given.

On Gymir's face was no hint of any old scars, just that content and happy smile. He was a good man, and a good shaman, and he hummed a little through his belly to keep them both company as he walked the small prince in towards the Queen's personal hall, where she stayed and did her work when she didn't need the throne room for appearances.

A wolf pup the size of a small bus lifted his head and uttered a funny little 'bork' at him, waving its grey tail with shivery intensity, and Loki patted its muzzle as he passed into the room. It smelled like dog in there, and warm spices, and mulling wine. Good smells, and comforting ones. He felt not entirely out of place for once, and that new strangeness made him almost change his mind and flee with a polite word.

Queen Farbauti was seated at what was for her a small table overloaded with decorated drop spindles, parchments, a spilling pile of fabrics, and at least six precariously leaning candles. Her private space was a mess, frankly, and she looked comfortable at it. "It's so nice to have room in which to spread my toys around," she said without looking up from a letter she was reading. Her long black hair was bound up in braids and ribbons, more for comfort than presentation, and she was wrapped in thick blankets. "And yet I keep cramming everything close to me."

She sighed and put the letter down, looking at Loki with lidded, wry eyes. "It's what happens when you fit a prison too long. Perhaps in time I'll actually get used to the open sky again, and grow to fit that, too. Hmm. So, Odinson, what brings you to Jotunheim this day? There was no notice of intent, so I'm making no assumptions."

Loki glanced to his side as Gymir left them, pressing his hands together and wondering why he felt suddenly so nervous. "Why do you still call me that?"

"It's not untrue. He _has_ been your father, a better one than you might have had otherwise." She leaned back, resting an elbow on the headrest of her tall chair. "Does it bother you so much?"

He frowned, not sure of the answer, exactly.

Farbauti studied his expression, and he saw her brows furrow together, tight and black, and it looked much like him in the mirror on stressful mornings. "All right, now you've really got my curiosity. Is it the old king? Is he sick?"

That surprised Loki, too. Farbauti was excellent at reading people, often even him - but this was a sudden slip of perception. He thought he might have been obvious, and yet he was not. "I…" His voice cracked, and that bothered him.

Concern creased Farbauti's face, deep and azure.

"You know." Loki looked up at the ceiling, and he fought himself free. "This matter with Thor, so fraught over his parentage. Turned out fine in the end, in a way, but what I wanted to agree with Thor about, should have, was that in the end it wouldn't have mattered what the truth was. Whether a goddess interfered, whether it had been someone else entirely that Odin had courted for the purpose of a royal heir, Frigga was his mother. And mine, of course. She was there for us all her life, and she did her best. With kindness in her heart."

Farbauti said nothing.

"But that's… that's not everything a family is sometimes, is it? And we lost her, in tragedy. That… it still hurts." Loki faltered, and old pieces of himself were screaming, reminding him that denial was better. Safer. He fought them, too. "But. Despite everything. Despite Odin's secrets and all the pain, and everything that went wrong. I. Well." The words squirmed in his mouth, because they were true and they hurt and he needed them. "I still have a mother, don't I?"

Still, Farbauti said nothing. She only looked at him, and either he couldn't read the expression on her face, or he wouldn't let himself.

Loki's voice was soft now, because it was all he had the courage for. "I was hoping to learn a little more about our family. If you'll tell me."

Farbauti shifted in her chair, pushing it back a few inches. She leaned out of it, towards him without looming, and she said, just as softly, "I think you would enjoy hearing about my Ma'mah, Loki. She would have liked you rather a lot."

. . .

There is a place on Earth that is a part of everywhere, and is yet an entirely hidden secret. In this place is a cave where time and space doesn't matter, because in this cave is the wellspring of this world's life, and life is eternal.

The cave has a keeper, a gardener, and She forever keeps it thriving no matter what the people living around it do, and it's not so much what or who the people are but that they try to survive that matters to Her. There is Life, and it fights to be itself, and She does her best to mother it. She is not life itself, but She is its keeper here.

She's left her cave a few times, but only a few. Always because She saw a chance to tend life elsewhere, in the hopes that it would continue to nurture and grow, and because it makes Her happy to do so. It's what She does. Sometimes She sees a piece of that greater Power that made her in passing, and Her name is Death, and Gaia thinks of her kindly, like a sister, because life and death are part of the same eternal tapestry and there's nothing to fear about any of it.

She remembers that distant Queen of that just as distant realm, grieving for life, for death, and for love. She remembers seeing a chance to give a life back and taking it, because it made them both happy to have it.

And sometimes, She sees the baby She helped bless into being walk on Her world, and it makes Her happy, because She hadn't intended to give Her world another protector, or avenger, but Thor is a good man, and he's learned to fight on behalf of kindness.

It is all She could have asked for, and She is content.

Gaia smiles from Her secret cave, and the dawning sun gleams ever brighter when She does.

. . .

 _…_ _And later yet, in a possible slip of future_ ~

It became a little harder every day to move the way he wanted to, but Odin did so if for no other reason to try and redeem his mistakes with the time he had left. One of those mistakes, a distant sort of old relationship that had been made out of anger and blame, was waiting for him in a private solar at his request. The guards didn't know about his guest, and his family certainly did not, and he supposed they would be eventually angry with him that here he was, building yet another secret behind their backs.

It was a habit, honestly. And habits, bad ones, should be broken. Odin knew that. And yet…

This secret had a very particular purpose, however, and when it became revealed, he hoped that the clarity of his choices would soothe that annoyance more quickly this time.

Family safety. It was better to talk to the family, yes. He understood that now. But he also knew how stubborn his sons could be, and how much they might put themselves in danger out of spite. So, fully knowing the consequences, Odin had sent word and built the outline of a plan. If his guest agreed to what he had to say, it would be in her hands from here. He would offer her his support as she needed.

The solar was just ahead. He reached out with a shaking hand - age and failing muscles and bone deep pain, and he looked at it as if it was a betrayer, and let himself in, looking at the sunlight where it outlined the shape of his guest. She rose, and gave him the proper curtsy, speaking with her head bowed. "I was very surprised at your letter, Your Majesty."

"Surprised enough that you came without a fight."

"You wrote it and invoked her name, sire. You know that's enough to bring me back to the palace."

Odin smiled, rueful. "Lady Kara, I won't waste your time since you have been kind enough to give it. I have a request for you, in the name of the family, and in the name of Frigga, who I believe to my soul would ask this of you should she be alive."

Lady Kara sat back down in her chair, and he saw the hidden blade under the sleeve of her silken blue dress, where one always was. He felt no threat from her, and that was nice, he decided. She was looking at him, doubtful and distrusting, and he didn't blame her, for he had often made her the scapegoat back when Frigga's plans were the real culprit. She said nothing, and she waited for him to speak.

"For the strife between us, I apologize."

Kara blinked, the only glimmer of surprise she gave.

"I am asking you, as a Lady of Asgard and as the… private contractor I know you are from time to time, to undertake what will undoubtedly be a difficult security assignment. With full financial support and information from this throne."

A single tweak, near her lip's corner. "On whose behalf?"

"Loki." Odin placed both his hands on his desk, using them to settle himself into his seat and trying to ignore the jolting ache in his hips. "My son is currently in a greater danger than he knows."

Lady Kara's lips pursed as she considered this. She folded her hands on the desk across from his and leaned towards him, a conspirator agreeing to his terms. "Tell me more."

~ _Fin_ …

 _A lion among ladies, is a most dreadful thing ~ A Midsummer Night's Dream_

Notes:

There's one other time that a fic underwent a major change when I was already in progress, and that was writing out Bruce Banner from The Janus Paradox after Age of Ultron released in theaters. It was a thing at the time, trying to sort of remain current with the MCU. We've let that slide more lately, and that's not what changed here.

The original outline for this fic had Thor remaining on Earth with Loki as SHIELD fought against the clock to figure out this knot with the UN. And being good natured and wanting to help, Thor makes a few missteps, creating further tensions with Loki even as they're also both trying to riddle out Odin's latest asshole mystery and what Gaia had to do with it.

All that shit went out the window once I sent the two on what was supposed to be a quick sidetrip to Alfheim. Aelsa and her Shakespearean-themed tangled affair became instantly way more interesting than what was mostly going to be another round of me being mad at the real world, and I realized eventually meeting Oberon and Titania was going to be lots more fun to write, too.

So about 80% of the outline got rewritten overnight, when I was already several chapters in. Interestingly, the final two chapters remained the same as that first outline. All that changed is how we got there. And of that… yeah, everything. Yikes.

Leamhan is Shakespeare's 'Moth,' one of Titania's servants in the play. His name is an old Irish word that means exactly that. Titania's servants are typically written as female fae, but since we can argue for unreliable narration to put English butts in seats, he's male now, an Elf who loves his Queen enough to conspire for her peace, not for cruelty's sake. Mooar the glashytn is a reference to Hom Mooar, a mythical fairy fiddler in Manx lore, where the glashytn seem to originate. Oberon and Titania need little clarification, although their physical depictions here are made up.

Aelsa is a comics importation, given a little more screentime here than she usually gets, and a little more grey complexity, too. She's fun. She's not at all evil, really, but she's fifteen steps ahead of everyone in her realm and loving it.

Baldur's painfully human crib death is my invention, although he is being mentioned here as a way to address the MCU ignoring that he exists in both myth and comics, while Hela, obviously, is me trying to thread the needle between her version in Ragnarok and her previous references in my fic, such as in 'We Lived in Castles,' which informs the incident where a young Loki very nearly dies.

It's not easy stuff. If you want to argue that I should be clearer about disagreeing with Odin's decisions here and that the brothers may have a chance at redeeming her, it's a good argument. Might be we'll get back to it. But I think of parents who don't understand how they wound up with a school shooter for a son, or lose them to drugs, and it's just… not easy stuff. Loki found his path towards redemption because it was the only way he was going to survive. Hela, as seen in Ragnarok, is utterly secure in herself. She may not want redemption.

I love all the fanart of the siblings hanging out being silly teens.

Gaia, in comics, is Thor's real mother. It was done to give him a closer bond to Midgard, though Frigga raised him. I'm skipping a lot. From the first outline, I wrestled with making her Thor's mother outright here, but I'm… mostly content with the path I took. There's some ambiguity if Frigga is left pregnant by Her touch, or if she and Odin had a good few nights after the shindig. It was unintentional on first draft, but I've also left it there, so hey. Her cave in the epilogue is a vague reference to a previous fandom of mine - in my head, it's the secret cave from LOST's final seasons.

I don't know when you'll see more Codex. I'm taking some time for a while, and there's a lot on my mind. So we'll see what the future has. I'll be around, and I'm always up to chat if you want to.

Try to be good to each other. Sometimes kindness really is the best we've got to give each other.

8/8/2018. All rights to Marvel.


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